Please Stand Up
by Chris Kenworthy
Summary: A sequel to "Divergence" and "Summer Love isn't always easy." Our heroes leave Roswell in a van and a motor home, trying to stay one step ahead of Kivar's invasion. But they didn't expect to find clues pointing them towards Max and Liz's true destiny.
1. Chapter 1: Roswell

"We don't have a plan!"

Max looked over at Liz Parker... (his girlfriend, his dearest love, his soul mate - these were the sort of things that his mind seemed to insist on tagging along at the end of her name, like they were her qualifications. But he forced himself not to pay attention to that.) "We... we have the same stuff that's always worked for us in the past. We can keep a low profile, and hide in plain sight. Keeping our enemies uncertain as to whether or not we're even here, and kicking butt when there's absolutely no other choice." He sighed. "And right now, keeping a low profile means getting to math class."

"Max, that won't be enough." Liz's cute-beautiful face was lit up with conviction as she pulled Max towards the nearest cover - which, unfortunately, was only the doorway alcove of an unused classroom, as opposed to somewhere that would offer real privacy like the school's eraser room. Again, Max's brain took off without permission, remembering some of the make-out sessions he had had with Liz in the eraser room, mostly in the spring of their sophomore year. Now they were both seniors, on the second day of classes, and...

"Well, I didn't mean math class specifically. Going to math class won't accomplish much at all," Liz continued in an intense whisper, "but it's still a good idea. But hiding in plain sight won't do it this time, Max. You, all of us, we've broken cover too many times, and your enemies may well know where to find everybody in the group. The King, or dictator, whatever, of an entire planet, is coming to Earth with the best of his soldiers, specifically to find _you_. Do you really think that you can escape from him by looking like just another teenaged boy in Roswell?"

Max sighed loudly. This was a train of thought that he'd abandoned a few times since hearing the news himself, mostly because he didn't like where it led. Maybe he didn't have that luxury anymore. Was it possible that affection for his home, for his parents, was making him stick his metaphorical ostrich head into the sand? "So... what's the alternative?" he asked in a hush, hoping that Liz would be able to think of a plan that he hadn't thought of, that the words that left her lips wouldn't me the ones that he was so very frightened of.

No such luck. "Max, max... I can't stand the thought either. But - but I think that we'll have to leave Roswell."

#

They couldn't talk about it any more right then - Math class was looming too near. Max wrestled with the concept of calculus limits and felt that he did tolerably well. After classes let out, the pair of them met up with Max's sister Isabel, Alex Whitman, and their good friend Michael Guerin. If Maria, Liz's oldest girlfriend, and Michael's girlfriend in another and slightly more recent sense, had been there, it would have been the six of them from the good old days. But Maria had to take a shift at work starting before any of the rest of them got off school. (Maria had a free for period eight, and as a senior was able to leave Study hall for a good reason.)

"The biggest problem with leaving town," Michael muttered, "is the Granilith. It's way too big to fit into any kind of vehicle up to a tractor trailer, and I don't think that we can afford to get and fuel a tractor trailer, not to mention the kind of attention a bunch of high school age kids driving a big rig would attract. And - we can't just leave it here in town, can we? It's an alien artifact, a hideously powerful one, and Kivar specifically is after it. That's the guy who's going to be here in a little more than a week. And we've been operating under the assumption that we can't possibly let him have it."

"Probably he's come to Earth for the sake of taking back the Granilith once and for all, just as much as he's here in order to find any or all of you guys," Alex agreed soberly. He was also an old friend of Liz's, and after years of dancing around the question, he and Isabel had almost literally shifted worlds to get back to each other's arms early that summer.

Max, Michael, and Isabel were each part alien... and not just any aliens, but in a strange way they were supposedly alien historical figures brought back to life after they'd been executed. On that alien planet, Max had been the young king of the planet of Antar, Isabel had been his sister the princess, and Michael had been the King's general and the sister's betrothed fiancee. This revelation of a supposed 'romantic destiny' between Michael and Isabel had thrown their relationships with Maria and Alex askew for a while, but thankfully the issue seemed to be resolved now. Destiny was out of the running.

"Well," Liz said, "could we use the Granilith itself to escape? Kill two birds with one stone, as it were? It can be used as a spaceship - Michael and Isabel went to another planet in it. If we're gone, and the Granilith is gone, then Kivar has nothing."

"A few problems I can see with that," Isabel said reluctantly. "One, the Granilith doesn't have unlimited capacity. I think even a group of six passengers would be pushing our luck... and if the three of us, and the three of you, come along - then that leaves a few of our other friends here on Earth to face Kivar themselves."

"Plus," Max put in, "That might be just what our alien enemies want. What if they've figured out a way to intercept the Granilith in flight, or track its movements to wherever we think is safe harbour?" He sighed. "I... I think that we're going to need to ask our alien friends if they have ideas for what to do about the Granilith."

"And what about ourselves?" Michael put in.

"Yeah, maybe they'll have some ideas about that," Alex agreed.

"I wouldn't count on it," Isabel said darkly. "When the problem is alien technology, yeah, aliens might give us an unearthly deus ex machina. But if the problem comes down to hiding from Kivar or fighting him here on Earth - then I think we're pretty much on our own. Remember, aliens don't understand what Earth is like."

"But we do," Liz said, warming to the topic. "And by that same argument, we have an advantage of Kivar and his troops. They don't really understand the territory. We've lived here all our lives - this is home. Maybe that'll be the edge that we need to hide against his superior forces."

"Maybe," Max said, reaching out and hugging Liz to him. "But I hope that that's enough."

#

Max went over to Rath and Ava's apartment that evening, after supper with his family, and was a little bit surprised to see Kyle Valenti already there. "Ava... she, umm, she didn't change her mind, did she?" Max blurted out on seeing Kyle, who he really had a very complicated history with.

"No, what, do I have to be dating her to come over and hang around?" Kyle laughed. A few weeks ago, on a trip to a beach town in Texas, Kyle and Rath had both declared their feelings for Ava, and near the end of their trip, she had chosen Rath, surprising Max more than a little. Maybe that was superficial of him. Kyle was handsome, athletic, and not without a certain playful charm, but Ava and Rath had known each other for all their lives, and she must know all of the hidden virtues that Max saw so rarely in Michael's near-twin.

It was still hard for Max to come to terms with Ava and Rath's continued presence as part of his circle of friends. They had grown up in New York, born of the same alien hybridization that had produced Max and his friends, so that each alien from Roswell had a counterpart in New York that was identical in appearance, but slight deviations in the alien-human DNA mix, and very different upbringing, had managed to create differences in character that were nearly as contrary as any cliche 'good twin, evil twin' pairings. Ava was the counterpart of Tess, originally from the Roswell pods but brought up elsewhere by a heartless, extraterrestrial shape-shifting bodyguard, and Tess was arrogant and manipulative where Ava was, on the whole, open and kind.

"Is there something on your mind, Evans?" Rath asked Max. "Or did you just come over here to stand in our doorway and stare into space like you're stoned?"

"Umm, yeah," Max shook his head. "More of the same as yesterday, I'm afraid. Kivar coming; overwhelming odds; staying here in town versus hitting the road - and figuring out what to do about the Granilith. We were thinking of using the communicator again, and I think you had it last, right?"

"Yeah, it's here." Rath waved the small, intricately designed alien gizmo with a small sigh. "Don't know if it's so smart an idea, though. Rayde said not to bother talking to them unless it was critically important. Kivar's ship might be able to trace the signal, at this point."

Max took a deep breath. "Figuring out how to protect the Granilith is **very** critically important."

"So," Ava added, "I guess that we'd better go talk to them before the K man gets any closer." She sighed. "I suppose that we could still wait for Isabel... or Michael."

"Yeah," Max agreed. "I'll call them over, though Michael may not bother coming."

He was right. Maria was just about to get away from her job at the Crashdown cafe and come by Michael's apartment, so Max wished him a pleasant night and moved on. His sister showed up a few minutes later, asking if they'd started without her again. (The first time they'd really got the communicator to work, Isabel and Alex had arrived in the middle of the conversation.)

"No, still waiting on you, your highness," Ava called back to Isabel. "Here, we're all set up in Rath's room. Who'd have thought that there'd be an upside to having a pad with a bedroom that doesn't have any windows?" For some reason that none of them had been able to put their fingers on, the alien communicator seemed to get its best reception in highly enclosed, energy-poor surroundings - a room with a door shut, heavy drapes hung or better still no windows at all, no electrical lights or other appliances running. It tended to produce very spooky conversation sessions - like they were running a seance and talking with ghosts and spirits of the departed, instead of life-forms who lived on planets far faraway.

Four of them waited in the darkness of Rath's messy room while he expertly made adjustments to the mechanism. "This is Rath, calling Raydeleen. On the line with me are Max and Isabel Evans, Ava, and Kyle Valenti."

"Ava Sullivan," Ava corrected, and Max made a small questioning noise. "Kyle said I should pick a last name, so I have. A little corny I know, but it's better than just 'Ava' without anything else, like I was some pretentious rock star..."

"Ava, hi," a clear voice suddenly 'said' from the communicator. "As interesting as that was, I think that you have bigger concerns to tell me about."

"Yes, Rayde," Max said, a little surprised that Raydeleen - an important official in the Antarian Royalist army - had replied to their original signal without some functionary coming on the line first to tell them that they were tracking her down. If it weren't for the urgency, he would have asked if there was some reason she was already watching the communication status of the 'Sanctuary' where she was based.

Instead - "I'll get right to the point. We've been, umm, going over tactical options, and it seems like we have no alternative to flee Roswell before Kivar gets here, possibly drawing him into a chase. But we can't move the Granilith, either over land, through the air, or into the space, without running the risk of leading Kivar straight to it. Is there any way to..." He struggled to come up with a more specific question, instead of simply asking the alien woman to solve the conundrum for him. "To... hide or seal the Granilith away so that Kivar can't get to it, even if he knows where it started from?"

There was a slight chuckle from Rayde, and then no more for several seconds. "You're... you're so close, Max, and it would be more secure if I didn't have to say it loud over the link, just in case someone is listening in." There was a pause. "The Granilith is capable of manipulating matter on the molecular and atomic levels, has considerable reserves of energy, and is able to carry out commands in pre-programmed sequences. Does that give you any hints?"

Max sighed, looking around as if he expected to get a cue gesture from one of his friends, but by the blinking light of the communicator it was impossible to see anyone else's face or hands. However, someone's knee bumped into Max's own, followed by a vaguely affirmative sound. "Okay, we'll try to take it from there." It did, after all, make sense to not broadcast their ideas in either direction over a communication link that might not be secure. "How are things on your world, Rayde? Is there any crisis brewing?"

"Not yet, at least." There was a very human-sounding sigh from Rayde - did the communicator's translation functions also cover nonverbal sounds? "I've been monitoring a nuclear standoff on Breeolyn - that's why I was able to come onto your circuit as quickly as possible. Oh, and one other thing may be of interest to you all."

There was a short silence. "What... what's that?" Kyle blurted out.

"The Essentologists studying Tess have confirmed something. The psychic spirit that she is implanted with is _not_ the correct one to match her DNA pattern, that of Ava the Bride Queen. We don't know what this means - there was no indication of this mix-up before the crash - if indeed it was a result of events from before your original landing on Earth."

Max sighed. Yet another bit of weirdness about the Roswell 'forty-seven crash, we absolutely did not need. "How's Tess doing, otherwise? How's the baby?"

"Mother and son are both doing fine. You'll be a father in about three months, as nearly as we can tell."

"Groan." That was another sore point. Tess had seduced Max and connived to bear his child, and even when Liz and Maria had found out about all of Tess' dirty laundry, there had been no way to deal with her other than taking her away from Earth, (where something in the air was mysteriously harming the unborn child,) and delivering her to one of the factions in an interstellar war. Liz had been enormously hurt by the revelation that her blonde-haired rival had been successful in having her way with Liz's alien soul-mate, and would be the mother of Max's firstborn, though there were enough extenuating circumstances that she blamed herself at least as much as Max. Max was very glad, actually, that Liz hadn't been here to listen to that last line.

"Okay, this'll probably be our last transmission unless something goes horribly wrong," Max said.

"That's right. Rath, did you try modifying the communicator to detect the approach of Kivar's ship?" Rayde asked.

"Yes, and it seems to be approaching faster than we thought," Rath replied. "Landing will be at T minus five days three hours, as near as I can work it. Goodbye."

"Goodbye, all." As the line went dead, Max groaned at the news of the enemy's quick approach, which Rath hadn't bothered to mention to him. Ava got up and turned the light on. Max turned to the person who had nudged him, which turned out to be Isabel, as he'd suspected.

"You've got an idea, now?" he asked.

"Maybe," Isabel replied. "Need to talk it over with Liz and Alex first. But basically... that thing's off, right?" She looked at Rath and the transmitter.

"Yeah, definitely," he insisted. "One hundred percent radio silence."

"Okay, then. If we could get the Granilith to make that new chamber for itself underground when we landed, why can't we drive it further underground? Like, say... a hundred miles down, in a random direction from Roswell... more or less, depending on how deep the crust is stable and solid. I can't remember those details from science class." She smiled grimly. "We can program it to surface at a particular time and place, but without knowing where and when, it'll be just about completely inaccessible to anyone. Even we won't be able to get to it until the right time."

"What if he has enough firepower to blow holes in the planet down that far?" Rath asked grimly.

"Then we probably could never be sure of keeping it away from him anyway," Ava countered, and Max nodded. "It's a good plan, better than anything else we can come up with I think." She sighed. "And we'd better do it soon."

"Friday night?" Max ventured. Slowly, each of them nodded. "That's two days from now. And then - we'd better get ready to run away from Roswell."

#

"Wow," Liz breathed, sitting very close to Max on the couch in his parent's living room later that evening. He'd driven over to pick her up after her shift so that they could spend a bit of time together... the two of them had pooled their money to buy a car at the end of the summer, and already it was proving to be an interesting logistical challenge to share it - but that kept them talking and driving hither and yon together, so really it was no bad thing. "I... I have to admit, I didn't expect you to go all kickass about this leaving town thing so soon." She leaned in, her straight dark hair brushing against Max's shoulder, and kissed him on the lips. "But I suppose it's good that you're getting everything organized." She shuddered. "We **really** don't have much time."

"No," Max admitted, shivering himself as he thought about actually leaving his home behind, of going 'on the run' with his friends, trying to outrace an enemy that could, at least sometimes, travel faster than light. "And... and there's another thing. Who... who actually goes? You and me, Michael, Maria, Isabel, Alex. Kyle, Rath, and Ava - anybody else?"

"Oh, right," Liz sighed. "Umm... gut reaction. Mister Valenti and Maria's mom... they know the truth, they can make up their own mind. Everyone else - my parents, your parents, and so on... No. Nobody tells them. They'll be safe here if they don't have anything to do with us. I **really** hope." She worried over that a little bit more. "Plus, I can just picture myself trying to convince my Dad that he has to leave the cafe behind because aliens are after me and my boyfriend. Even if he believes the alien part... he wouldn't want to go."

"Okay." Max nodded. "It... it's been a long day, and I don't really want to talk about hairy alien danger any more."

Liz's face suddenly lit up with a hint of a playful smile. "Oh, no? Then... what do you want to do? Something that doesn't, umm, doesn't require much talking?" She was moving while softly whispering the words, almost purring deep beneath her throat. The two of them had already been sitting in a very intimate pose, their thighs touching, but now Liz swivelled herself around and stretched her legs out across Max, so that her thighs came up onto his lap. One leg brushed against something else that was making its presence felt in Max's lap. Max bent sideways to try to kiss Liz, but their position made this awkward and he soon realized that his lips were actually going to end up in the vicinity of Liz's shoulder. However, this part of Liz's body wasn't covered by the summery tank top that she was wearing, and Max decided not to waste the opportunities offered by that happy accident, nuzzling her soft skin and kissing the gently concave spot just underneath her collarbone. Liz sighed loudly and squirmed, which had the effect of exciting things even further in Max's lap.

"Umm, isn't it pretty late for a school night, guys?" Max groaned as he realized that his parents were standing in the dining room doorway.

"Yeah," Liz whispered. "We should have done this out in the car." Max tried to choke down his inappropriate laughter.

"Umm, yeah," Max agreed out loud when he had regained control over his breathing. Liz sitting up straight in the traditional way helped, though he hoped that his parents wouldn't notice what wasn't anything in his pocket.

Liz smiled, and another thing Max hoped his parents couldn't see was the playfulness in her expression. "G'night, sweetie." She stood lithely up, and held out a hand in an expectant gesture.

"You sure you're be alright driving home by yourself, dear?" Mrs Evans asked.

'Yes, mom," Liz drawled with a trace of sarcasm, and in one slightly hurried movement Max got up, hurried Liz over past his parents to the front door, and pressed the car keys into her hand. Liz took the opportunity to kiss him goodnight, a sweet and chaste kiss that wouldn't make either of them any more bothered about having to split up. Once Liz had gotten behind the wheel of the old two-door sport sedan, waved once towards the Evans, and driven away, Max hurried towards his bedroom before Dad could start a conversation.

#

"Hey Max," Maria said, slipping into a seat across the courtyard table from him the next day. "How heavy is the planet today?"

Max looked up at her and couldn't stifle a laugh. "Is it so easy to tell that I'm propping it up with my very own shoulders?" he joked back, and Maria mixed a shrug and nod and showed him what the resulting blend looked like. "All I really want to do is keep my own little world from crashing down around me, and the rest of the place can take care of itself," Max said feelingly. "But how're you? I missed you around yesterday."

"Thanks," she replied. "I'm, umm, about as good as can be expected when everyone else is so twitchy... well, Michael and Liz especially. Alex is remaining surprisingly calm - but then, I suppose the fact that he's already 'died' once this year and came back might have something to do with it."

"Yeah," Max replied absently, and lowered his voice just in case. "Listen, how's your mom doing with the whole revelation thing lately? I mean, I haven't seen her particularly much since... well, since she found out about the whole 'alien' thing." The key word had just been mouthed, not even breathed.

"Umm..." Maria whispered back. "Not too great, not too bad, all things considered - like Alex, or me, when we first found out. For a long time it was as if she didn't want to know any more, and then when she found out that Michael was back in town, she hauled us both in for an interrogation session. She's been asking some more questions lately, too - she spotted Rath and Ava somewhere, and I've told her part of the deal with them."

"Okay," Max muttered. "I was meaning to ask about that." He took a deep breath. "If... if the worst comes to worst, and we have to leave Roswell, would you want to ask your mom to come along?"

Maria blinked. "Wow - what a question! Would you?"

"I don't think it's a good option for my case," Max said regretfully. "My parents don't know anything - not for sure, which means that it'd be nearly impossible to convince them about the situation in time, and they're probably safer if they don't get told anything."

"Ahh." Maria considered that. "I... I think I'd ask her, yeah. But she might not want to go... she's built a life and a business here in Roswell."

"She's better placed to leave than Liz's parents, at least," Max remarked idly. "They've invested in a place, a restaurant - something that they'd really lose out on if they left behind." He caught the look in Maria's eyes and sighed. "Yeah, I know that your mom has invested in inventory of, umm, of various kinds, and that she's made a lot of valuable business contacts here in Roswell. Still, it's not quite the same thing."

"Whatever," Maria replied, and that seemed to signal the end of the topic. "I guess it looks like we won't be making it to the welcome-back dance after all." That was a West Roswell High social event, held a week and a half later, (which seemed kind of late to be welcoming people back in Max's opinion, but the student social committee hadn't asked him.)

"No," Max admitted. "We could have a formal of our own, or at least some kind of party." He sighed. "A 'goodbye to Roswell, maybe forever' fling, as far as that goes."

"Hmm." Maria chewed on that thought. "Does Kyle get to ask someone? He's kind of the odd one out at this point."

"Does he get to ask someone what?" Michael asked, suddenly appearing behind Maria and leaning down to give her a kind of a modified bear hug. "Hmm?"

"Uhh..." Maria made a vague waving gesture from the elbow to a seat beside her, (because she couldn't move her upper arms while Michael's grip was encircling them,) and Michael caught the hint, letting her go and sitting down in the indicated position. Maria gave him a warm kiss, and then whispered, "Max suggested we have a dress-up party, with soft music and dancing, because we won't be able to go to the ball this year."

"Oh, he did, did he?" Michael shot Max an unimpressed look, and Max remembered all of the fuss about their junior prom last year, which had prompted one of Michael and Maria's most memorable mid-length fights of the year. (Mid-length being usually defined as an argument that lasted, well, something like from twenty hours to six days.) Max just shrugged, not feeling particularly inclined to come to his best friend's rescue. He liked the idea of dressing up and going to a big to-do with dancing, especially now that he and Liz were really back together. He'd escorted Liz to the junior prom himself, but just as friends, and the events of the dance had managed to set off a deep and bitter rift between them that lasted for weeks that spring.

Meanwhile, Michael had introduced yet another new topic. "I've been thinking about what we'll need for the big run, Max." Max sighed. Everything about their departure from Roswell was starting to seem so real, from goodbye partied to planning necessities. "Crowding into a van, or even two vans, for a road trip of unknown length, and not being sure of how long we'll be able to stop sounds like the pits. How about we try to get our hands on a decent RV?"

"Hmm..." Maria sighed. "Isn't it more noticeable?"

"Who's the dude who wrote about the stolen letter that was hidden in plain sight?" Michael did not wait even slightly for the answer. "Yeah, it's hard to see an RV, but if you're looking for a bunch of kids on the run from an alien army, would you really **notice** it?"

"It's an idea worth looking into, yeah," Max agreed and sighed. "Of course, _where_ we get it still needs to be sorted out. I don't want to get into grand theft auto at this point - we're in enough trouble already."

"Oh, are you sure? I've heard it's a heck of a game," Michael said. Max looked at him dubiously. "Grand Theft Auto, the violent computer game? Gee Tee Ay? Ringing any bells here Maxwell?"

Max didn't answer, mostly because in staring at Michael he had seen something else, or someones else. "Liz! Ava!" Max waved widely, and the two girls, somewhat unlikely good friends, hurried over to join the confab in progress.

"Hey, what are you doing here, Ava?" Michael asked the short, pretty blonde girl. "Haven't signed up for classes just as we may have to be leaving?"

"Nah, but Isabel asked me to come over to the computer lab and help out with the planning for Project Sub-bedrock," Ava replied. Max nodded - he had known that Liz was working with Isabel and Alex to research their plans for hiding the Granilith deep underground, but hadn't known that Ava would be invited. In fact, Max had volunteered to help out, since he was pretty good with science and making plans and stuff like that, and Liz had kissed him and said no, that they'd be okay, and he hadn't really thought any more about it. The fact that Ava had been invited along too made him suddenly question the whole deal.

Liz must have noticed the puzzled expression on Max's face, because she reached out to take his hand in hers. "Come on, babe, let's walk." Shrugging, Max nodded goodbyes at Michael, Maria, and Ava, and headed off towards the edge of school grounds with Liz. It was still about fifteen or twenty minutes before the first class of the day would start, but other students were already starting to come near. "Isabel... Isabel told me what Raydeleen said - the stuff about Tess. The things that I guess you didn't want to mention to me."

"I... I didn't think you wanted me to mention Tess to you ever again if I could help it," Max said with an uncertain smile. "You... you always get twitchy and uncomfortable when she comes up."

"Well, I think that you can understand why." Liz sighed. "She plotted to steal you away from me - though she got some help from me and from circumstance there - and she covered up her involvement when she thought that Alex was dead. But... but when there's still important stuff going on with her, I'd rather that you told me, rather than trying to keep me in the dark. I always want to know what's going on in your life, no matter how hard it might be to hear."

"Easy to say," Max pointed out. "And it's a bit harder to live up to. If I have much about her to tell you, you'll start to resent me for continually bringing up her memory again and again, hurting you that way."

"Yeah, I know," Liz sighed. "But unfortunately she's not really out of our lives, as long as she's the mother of your son. No matter that she hasn't even given birth to the baby, and they're both so far away that we have no true conception of it." The two of them turned to follow a chain link fence, on the inside, the school lawn as opposed to the city sidewalk that was on the other side of the barrier. "What... what did you think of the stuff about Tess not having the... the spirit, the essence of the true bride in her?"

"I... I never know what to make of that kind of stuff, Liz," Max complained. "You know that." Not only had the aliens of their group been engineered from the alien DNA of specific people, but supposedly the Roswell foursome had also been given the 'essence' of their departed forebears... which most of the other aliens that they'd met seemed to regard as a kind of artificially induced reincarnation - that in their eyes, Max **was** King Zan of the house of Liaret, once overlord of all planet Antar, now born again. The fact that he remembered little of that other life didn't seem to matter, any more than in human reincarnation traditions... well, most people supposedly didn't remember much of their previous incarnations without special spiritual traditions or hypnotism or whatever else - Max didn't really believe very much in that sort of thing either.

The alien essence stuff was also tied into the supposed romantic destinies that they had had with each other - Tess had come to Roswell certain that she was Max's true love, the girl of his dreams, and the fact that he'd been happily involved with Liz had instantly triggered a fierce competitive streak in the petite blond alien girl. Finding out that they had been married in a previous life had only strengthened Tess' convictions. So... "If Tess really **isn't** the reincarnation of Queen Ava, whoever that really was... then - then maybe Ava is?" Max didn't want to even say the words. He didn't want a possible link to Ava to disrupt his relationship with Liz just as it was getting back into a good place, and Ava didn't seem to have any interest in him that way, as far as that went. (Of course, even if she didn't, Ava would never betray her closest friend by trying to move in on Liz's man.)

"Umm... Ava doesn't think so," Liz said. "Though maybe we don't have enough information, it seems like none of the New York four really got specific alien spirits." She sighed. "That fits with why Nicholas and all of the other aliens were concentrating mostly on you guys. And - and what I was wondering about wasn't so much, 'If Tess isn't queen Ava, then who is,' so much as, 'If Tess isn't Queen Ava, then who is _she_?'" Liz giggled nervously. "Umm, do you get the point of the distinction?"

"You mean, you think that she has the reincarnated spirit of somebody else?" Max clarified.

"Well, that's the way Rayde said it, right?" Liz insisted. "Not, 'we don't think she got implanted with a spirit' or 'we don't think the spirit that was implanted in her survived,' but 'we think the spirit that she is implanted with is _not_ queen Ava.'"

Max let out a long breath. "Yeah, that... of course, we can't get too hung up on phrasing. We're talking about a translator circuit in that alien device, which may not have been able to convey the statement that Rayde meant in her own language, to sufficient detail to allow semantic niceties like that. But if that's even possible... who do _you_ think that she is?"

"I... I don't know, Max," Liz admitted soberly. "Maybe it's nobody that we've heard of yet - maybe somebody was able to bring additional alien spirits to earth, not long after 1947. But still..." She considered, and then shrugged. "If... if it's at all possible, I want to try to figure out what happened to Tess, when we leave Roswell. I - I think it might be important."

"Umm... if we can, then that's fine by me," Max agreed. "We should probably put it up to the whole group - I don't really want to declare a quest like that only on the basis of my dubious royal authority."

"Of course, your majesty," Liz teased him. "And certainly, if it's a case of survival versus curiosity, then we survive. That's patently obvious." She stopped walking. "Now kiss me, before the first period warning bell rings."

Max smiled. "That, I can definitely do." He wrapped his arms around Liz's lithe figure and her lips seemed to melt into him, surrounding his heart with an aching, enervating fire. Liz's own arms found their way to Max's back, pressing his chest into hers... and right then, of course, the bell rang. "Something always seems to interrupt us."

"Maybe not always, big boy," Liz said in a breathy whisper. And then they hurried over to get into the school.

#

"Okay, who wants to do the honours?" Rath asked, as they filed their way into the underground Granilith chamber. This was only the second time that Max had been here - though he'd been in the older Granilith chamber, the one adjacent to where their incubation bods had been housed, in the rocky peaks near the Puhlman ranch crash site northwest of town, many times. But when Isabel and Michael had used the Granilith to take Tess away from Earth, it had pretty much ruined that structure, melting the stone to the point that the way in was completely unusable, and on their return landing they had placed the Granilith at a more convenient point, south of town and not far from the main highway, concealed about nine feet under the desert floor and accessible only by a secret stairway mechanism. This new chamber had some of the same strange architectural style as the old one, but it was smaller, and for all nine of them to crowd in was a tight fit.

The 'Big G' itself, however, was the same as ever - mysteriously imposing and impossibly enigmatic, shaped like a giant cone balanced on its point, the surface shiny and metallic. There were a few small interface devices near it, one of which was designed to receive the short rod of cloudy and irregular crystal that was the Granilith's 'ignition key.' This was required to get the thing to do anything at all. As far as just what it could do...

"Not I," Max quickly disclaimed. "Aside from launching it into space, I wouldn't know how. One of you guys do it." He turned towards Michael and Isabel, holding out the rod.

Both his sister and his best friend hesitated. "Umm... Michael, you used it more on that alien planet, right?" Maria asked.

"Yeah," Michael argued. "But Isabel is the one who understands the plan better." He turned to Isabel. "All yours - if you think you're up to it. Otherwise, I'll take my best shot."

Isabel sighed, reached out, and took the key. "And... and don't strain yourself while you're linked to it," Michael quickly added. "We don't want to have to do a healing stone ritual on you."

"Like you strained yourself, when you were shooting at those alien spaceships?" Isabel said

"Don't worry - **I** have a little bit more sense."

Isabel walked over, put the rod into the receptacle, and laid her hand upon the surface of the Granilith cone itself. Suddenly, something strange started to happen - such a distortion of the usual rules of his reality that Max was staggered with the intensity of it, like waves on the surface of space and time, washing over him. No, not quite - the distortion wasn't quite as fundamental as the space he walked through, it was more... psychic, mental. Like something was trying to change the way his consciousness worked. Most of the others were having trouble too, Max was just able to realize - Isabel, Michael, Rath, and Ava about as much as he, Liz slightly less so, and Alex and Maria hardly seemed to be affected. He couldn't get a good look at Kyle.

And then, things settled down somewhat. The horrible waves crashing down around his head from nowhere had stopped, but things were still not back to normal. It was like the difference between looking through air and looking through glass, or something like that. He could breathe, but every move he made, everything he saw, every sound he heard was distinctly alien.

"The... the transition is complete now," he said, seeing it, "or at least halted. The wave sensation was a mental transformation in progress, and right now it's being... maintained."

"What... what kind of mental transformation?" Alex asked, alarmed. "I... I felt something weird going on, but... Isabel - are you okay?"

"Isabel Evans will return to you after interface mode has been disconnected," Isabel's mouth said in an eerie, toneless voice. Even though Max didn't understand all of what was going on, he could tell that this wasn't a joke that Isabel was playing - that she really wasn't the... the entity that was communicating through her. Given that her hand was still flat against the Granilith cone, it wasn't hard to guess what that other entity was. "Interfacing... with the Granilith itself? Are... are you sentient, Granilith?" That was something that Max had never even thought of.

"The consciousness or free will of this unit is fundamentally undecidable," Isabel intoned. "However, sufficient processing power is available to provide a semblance of 'intelligence'. Interface mode has been implemented as an aid to programming, and was automatically triggered because of a confluence of requisite criteria."

"What... what's going on here?" Maria asked, sounding as freaked as Alex. "Max... Max, are you talking to the Granilith somehow? I couldn't really understand what you said. And is it answering you somehow?"

"Can't... can't you hear what Isabel is saying?" Liz asked, and it was clear from the expressions on Alex and Maria's face that they couldn't. There were still many things that Max didn't understand here. Should he ask all of the unanswered questions about the Granilith and this 'interface mode', or just proceed with what they had planned to do as quickly as possible?

Michael had already made up his mind, it seemed. "Okay, you tin cone," he growled at the Granilith. "Why don't Alex and Maria hear you when you speak through Isabel's voice? What are these criteria? And if you could use Isabel as an - an interface, why did you need to do all of that floopey stuff with the air in here?" It figured, Max realized silently. Always the least subtle of them (with the possible exception of Rath,) Michael hadn't realized that the floopeyness was inside their heads, not really in the air.

"The answers to queries one and three are sufficiently related to be answered as one," Isabel began. "Interface mode is not capable of simply communicating through the vocal and auditory apparatus of a proxy person. To complete the interface mode, temporary mental alterations must be made to those who would speak, and listen, on a para-psionic basis. Individuals within the chamber who do not possess a sufficiently high psi rating cannot be so altered without risking permanent brain damage."

"So only those of us with some basis for alien powers can speak to you or hear what you say, even with Isabel's body as a communication aid," Max filled in. "And there is no risk of harm to any of us from this process?"

"Chances of complication are statistically insignificant in the first ten earth minutes of Interface mode." Isabel's chest breathed. "Second query from Michael Guerin - the criteria included the presence of required key personnel in the chamber, the insertion of command key, and the mental recognition pattern of a series of instructions in Isabel Evans' mind that she was not able to specify by more conventional input methods."

"Right," Max said. "Let's get to programming. Umm - Liz, do you want to..."

"Alright, Granilith," Liz said, stepping forward slightly and holding her chin up a little higher than normal. "I am going to give you a list of instructions that you are not to begin on until a specific countdown command is given, and until all personnel are safely out of the chamber. Firstly, this chamber will be allowed to collapse, and you will travel beneath the earth's surface to a depth of sixteen point eight kilometers down, two point seven kilometers south, and eight hundred forty meters to the east. There you will embed yourself in the surrounding rock as solidly as possible. Is this step feasible?"

"It is, Liz Parker," Isabel replied, and Liz jumped slightly.

"Alright. In Twelve point eight years, you will surface again, at the following GPS co-ordinates." She took a slip of paper from Isabel's hands and read them out. "That will be another few kilometers south and west. There, you will establish another command chamber, seal the door against any entry but that of Max Evans, Isabel Evans, Michael Guerin, or Ava Sullivan, however if the door or chamber is breached by superior firepower you will not attempt to repel such intrusion. Understood?"

"Understood - but a point of information. Liz Parker, you can also set your own handprint to open the chamber door. Also, the characteristic 'codes' of your mental pattern can be voluntarily loaned to others on a contingency basis, whoever these loaner codes will not be honoured unless specific instructions along those lines are given at this point."

Liz turned to Max. "Sure, give yourself the key," Max admitted, though he was surprised by this reference. "As far as the loaner codes - is there any possible way to steal those without the intent of the owner to loan?"

"Intent is not a binary function," Isabel said. "Loan of mental codes from an unwilling donor can be induced by physical torture methods, or use of psi power to induce mind control."

"But if our enemies get us in such bad shape," Rath said, "they can probably get us to take them inside the chamber anyway. Err... get **you** to take them inside."

Max nodded in agreement, not commenting on the fact that Rath had been left off the access list. He could understand why. Liz smiled slightly. "Okay, add me to the list, and permit the use of loaner codes. Save that step." Isabel nodded.

"Now, in the event that the surrounding bedrock is broken by earthquake or other forces before the time period are up, preventing you from hiding in that place," Liz continued, "then you will attempt to travel through warp space, evading pursuit as necessary, and travel to a rocky planet near the following Antarian co-ordinates." Now Liz spoke a much more complicated series of numbers... distances in the Antarian units for interstellar mapping, then the planet's distance from its primary in Earth kilometers. "You will bury yourself only about one point five kilometers underneath this planet, and at the end of the same time period (adjusting for time distortions in warp space as best possible,) will surface at the closest point below the planet's surface, creating an underground chamber as specified for the 'Earth scenario'. However, if you have had to relocate on this contingency planet, you will also broadcast a radio signal to assist in location."

"Clarification," the Granilith's voice put in through Isabel. "Provide a specific location on the contingency planet to travel to underground."

"Leave that unspecified," Liz put in. "We don't know enough of its parameters to give you detailed instructions. Just pick any location randomly and..." She shook her head. "No - identify the planet's rotation axis when you arrive, and find the spot of highest elevation on the rotational equator. Land one kilometer east of that spot."

"And the parameters of the radio signal?"

Liz looked around, nearly defeated by the Granilith's relentless pursuit of precision. Ava spoke up. "Are you familiar with the Earth specifications of AM radio?" Michael clapped silently in appreciation.

"Affirmative."

"Then broadcast the maximum legal AM signal on the eight hundred ten station," Ava said. "Umm, a middle C major third scale, repeating indefinitely." Middle third major C didn't give the Granilith any trouble either, somewhat to Max's surprise. How much had the Granilith managed to figure out about human society and culture? Or was it tuning into Isabel's mind for this stuff? Max doubted that Isabel knew the technical specifications for AM radio signals or the absolute pitch of middle C offhand.

"Is there anything that we're forgetting?" Liz asked. Nobody else suggested additions. "Complete program."

"Program is complete. Now awaiting execution instructions."

"Execute in four minutes," Max said.

"Four minute countdown confirmed... now. Please retrieve the crystal key and exit the chamber. Interface mode will terminate in five seconds... three, two, and one." Finally Isabel's hand left the Granilith cone, and all of the strangeness about Max's senses suddenly disappeared, not in confusing waves like they had come, but suddenly.

"Isabel, are you okay?" Liz suddenly blurted out. "The program's been input - we need to leave." And Liz rushed forward to grab the key. The teenagers, human, not-quite-human, and hybrid alike, hurried up the stairs and out of the hatchway in an orderly line. Nobody turned back until they had reached the cars, just out of sight of the road. Rath checked a digital watch. "There's still forty-nine seconds to go."

"Good," Maria muttered. They waited out the time quietly, and a quiet rumbling sound started when Rath's countdown was up, never getting too loud and quickly dying away. The ground beneath them might have shaken slightly, though it was hard to be sure.

"Is... is that it?" Isabel muttered. "Stupid question, I guess."

"That's all of it, I guess," Max agreed. "Granilith is no longer in the area, and I think Kivar would have a heck of a hard time if he tries to go after it directly." He took a deep breath. "So, party night tomorrow, and then we take off."

"Great," Kyle muttered, leading the way over to his car.

"Did you find anyone to take to the party, Kyle?" Rath asked, not without an edge of superiority. Kyle didn't answer.


	2. Chapter 2: Private party

The morning before the farewell party, Max went into his sister's bedroom, and saw Isabel sitting on her bed, looking at pictures from a family album, and brushing tears off of her face. "This... this is getting to be uncomfortably familiar."

Isabel smiled. Of course she remembered what it had been like when they'd been getting ready to leave in the Granilith for Antar, thinking that it'd be the four of them - Max, Isabel, Michael, and Tess - and that they'd be gone for years if not forever. Of course, things had changed, so quickly and so confusingly that Max still couldn't wrap his brain around them comfortably, and he had stayed, while his sister and his oldest friend ferried Tess and the baby off-planet - and came back. "Yeah, well." Isabel sighed. "You got everything all ready for the formal affair?"

"Yeah, tux is rented - Liz said that she doesn't want to bother doing flowers, so that's pretty much it. What about you?"

"Oh, my gown's all ready," she said. "I really, **really** hope that Alex likes it." Isabel looked around the room, as if adding another string of pictures to a mental file to save and cherish. "I... I'd have liked to have him get me a corsage, but... well, with _nobody_ else interested in doing it; I decided that - that it seemed weird." She shrugged.

"Maybe you should tell him you've changed your mind," Max suggested. "Nobody else cares about you being weird - not tonight of all nights. You should do whatever it takes to get it perfect." He had to rub his arm slightly - Isabel had cuffed him one when he'd said the part that implied she was definitely weird. "And... and Alex won't mind getting them for you."

"Well, he won't complain," Isabel agreed. "He might even enjoy the fact that it pleases me. But it'd be a huge hassle to go out and get them at this point, and I know he's busy packing up and clearing anything alien-related off of his computer, and things that he just doesn't really want to worry about other people snooping in after we're gone." She sighed. "Apparently, you have to be _really_ thorough to keep other people from figuring out what was in a file you delete off your computer."

"Yeah, I've heard that - if those other people are smart and thorough themselves," Max said with a slight smile. "So... are you sure about not leaving anything for Mom and Dad to find... a note, a recorded CD, anything to explain to them why we had to go?"

"Uhh... yeah," Isabel said. "After... after last time, I... I could hardly even figure out what to write without breaking down into tears, I think. And - and we don't really know what to say to them, do we now? If we say we're going forever, then we might be able to come back in a few weeks, and it'd be really awkward. And - and if we say it'll only be a little while - and then, and then..."

"Yep, I realize that," Max agreed. "Though... if we come back after saying nothing at all, it'll still be awkward," he pointed out, and Isabel giggled slightly. "Well... is it okay if I write a really short note, not saying much? I... I don't know what I'd say either, but I just think some warning might be better than nothing."

"Umm, sure," Isabel said after taking a long moment to think about it.

"Alright." Max hurried over to Isabel and gave her a big hug. He was a little surprised at the impulse - they weren't generally that huggy a family, but it was just something that he had to do right then. "I... I hope you and Alex have a great time tonight."

"Oh, we will," Isabel replied. "Don't worry about that." She looked up at him - and wiped her eyes dry again. "The same thing goes for you and Liz. So we'll pick Alex up around quarter to, and then go over to the Crashdown?"

"Umm, sure, sounds good to me," Max said. "I... I'm going to go check my own computer, actually."

"Good idea." Isabel giggled. "We wouldn't want mom and dad to find those torrid, nearly obscene love letters that you write and never actually _send_ to anyone."

"They're... they're not nearly obscene," Max spluttered. "Just... well, I was shooting for 'erotic', and _why_ were you snooping around on my computer in the first place?"

"Umm, looking for some spare space to store Charmed video files," Isabel replied. Max shook his head and hurried away.

#

Max pulled into the parking lot of the Crashdown Cafe, got out from behind the driver's seat, and had just turned the corner of the building, heading for the front door of the dining room when he heard a couple of different voices yelling at him. One was Isabel's - she had been in the back seat, along with Alex. The other voice was up from about ten feet above the parking lot, where Liz was standing on the 'balcony' ledge outside her bedroom window, waving at him. "Hey, I'll be down in a minute. Meet me at the side door."

Max jogged toward her, drinking in the way Liz's permed hair was blowing in the evening breeze, and the rich blue fabric clung to what he could see of her body. "Why don't you climb down the ladder?" he asked playfully.

"Not in a dress this nice - err, not again," Liz said. Max smiled slightly, remembering the valentine's day a year and a half ago when he'd accidentally gotten drunk, and Liz, (in the middle of a formal date that the local radio station had set up as part of a publicity stunt contest,) had spirited him away to keep him from blowing his own secret until things calmed down, except that he didn't sober up from waiting around. "Just - just give me a minute."

Max went over to the small side door out of the back of the cafe into the parking lot, which customers weren't supposed to use but a lot of them did, including all of Liz's friends. The idea flitted through his mind that Liz might have also refused to climb down the ladder just because she was wearing a dress, but her blue formal gown turned out to be a long one, and fitted in such a way that he thought she probably wouldn't have had any difficulties on the ladder either from a mobility or an exposure point of view - but then, Max didn't really know that much about girls' clothes, of course.

"Hi," Liz said, smiling in that unbelievably cute way that she had that made her cheeks dimple, but only the very slightest bit. "You look very handsome like that, Max."

"Ehh, all I tried to do was match," Max said. Liz had said that she'd be wearing deep royal blue, so he'd managed to find a rental tux in dark blue. The shade wasn't quite the same, unfortunately, but overall Max thought that they complimented each other nicely. Liz's hair was curlier than usual, as Max had noticed earlier, but there were also two braids or tails running down either side of the back of her head, overtop the loose hair - it was an oddly exotic touch, and one that Max quite liked the effect of. Her gown was fairly simple but beautiful - thin shoulder straps that were probably just a bit too big to be described with the word 'spaghetti', a V-neckline that was just low enough to tease without being obvious about it, and quite a lot of gentle hugging of the curves of Liz's figure. That was the dress, which was hugging her curves - at least, for now. Max laughed to himself softly at that thought. "You're ravishing tonight, my darling."

"Then maybe you should ravish me before midnight," Liz whispered in Max's ear, and then turned away from him to sashay over to the car. Max recovered from his shock at her words just in time to see Liz shaking her tight ass at him ever so slightly, before she got to the car and sat in the shotgun seat. Max tried to keep his mind and his blood from racing as he walked over to the car himself. He and Liz had flirted a lot over the two years that they'd known each other, obviously, but he didn't think that she had ever said anything so clearly suggestive to him before. Did she mean it? Was this... he cut off that line of thought as he climbed back into the car himself. "Okay, boys and girls," Liz gushed. "Are we ready to _party down_?"

"I think I'd rather party up," Alex joked. "Or maybe just rock the night away."

"Whatever you want, babe," Isabel replied softly.

"Hey, Izzie," Liz said, turning slightly in her seat to face the other girl, as Max started the car again and began to drive. "I **love** your outfit - Lady in red again?"

"Well, come on - what else am I going to do, with this guy so crazy about it," and Isabel reached out to take an affectionate hold of Alex's shoulder. "He's probably going to have me wearing red for every big event of our lives... assuming that we get to spend our lives together, I mean."

"Ooh, even the wedding day?" Liz teased. "No white wedding gown for you?"

"No, definitely she'll get to wear white on _that_ day," Alex joked back. "That's always assuming that I'm lucky enough to actually etcetera etcetera. I don't think I'd get a say in that."

"No, you wouldn't," Isabel agreed. "But I'm not **absolutely** sure that I'll want a traditional wedding with a white gown and all." She sighed. "It's so long in the future, anyway."

"And, even though I **do** like how you look in red," Alex continued, "It... it does lose a little bit of its magic if you use it on **every** special occasion, and wear it a lot of the rest of the time, just because." Isabel turned to look at him. "It's up to you, of course. But... but I think I'd like to see you in other colors a bit more of the time. Like maybe purple, for my big Sterling rose fan." Isabel smiled slightly. "After all, nobody's yet invented a color that could diminish your beauty by a single drop."

"Oh please," Liz laughed. "What about puke green?" Isabel looked up at her with a hint of a glare, but Liz had become completely immune to Isabel's glares by this point, unless she put some serious hostility into them.

Isabel's dress was quite striking even aside from its bright red color. It certainly looked very different from Liz's fairly traditional formal gown. The red fabric covered her shoulders, reaching up to her neck in a high color and stretching down her arms almost to the wrists - however, there was a small, tasteful, but suggestive hole appearing just around her stomach area, and two others on the side of her torso several inches below her arms, thus revealing skin around her impressively large chest from every direction **except** the usual angle of approach from above. The skirt was also on the short side, ending about midway between butt and knees, allowing long stretches of fit and smooth legs to be seen between the hem and the heels. Alex hadn't gotten the full effect of the outfit yet, since Isabel had already been in the car when they'd picked him up, and Max made a mental note to take a look at his friend's face when he first saw Isabel stand up and walk in her dress. (That would be better than watching his sister himself, after all.)

It wasn't a long drive to their eventual destination. Alex's eyes popped just about as wide as Max had expected when the moment came, and Isabel giggled and leaned close to whisper something in his ear that Max entirely didn't want to hear. Her ponytail fell this way and that when she laughed a moment later - Isabel's hairstyle, also, was very different from Liz's, just that simple ponytail, which oddly made her look like the fairytale princess that she'd always insisted that she didn't want to be - at least, not an alien fairytale princess. Max took Liz's arm in his, turning away from his sister and her date, and headed up to the door of the simple bungalow house, on the 'comfortable' side rather than 'affluent', but Max liked it.

"Hi, Max." Before he could knock, the door had been opened by a striking woman in her mid-thirties. "Why, Liz, you look gorgeous, and guys, your colors match so well." Amy DeLuca, Maria's mother, leaned close to Liz and whispered "I hope that this night goes as well as prom did badly." Max hoped that too, not that he was terribly worried about it.

Amy Deluca was younger than the parents of any of Max's other friends, which probably said a lot about her family's history. Max didn't know all of the details - in fact, he had never managed to find out much about Maria's father except that he had left town when she was young. But it was clear that Amy had found herself having a baby before she was quite out of her teenage years, and a lot of the restrictions she tried to put on her daughter's social life, and of their fights about that, had their roots in Amy's fears about Maria repeating her mistakes when it came to men, and an attempt to head those kind of problems off at the pass. Maria's relationship with Michael hadn't done too much to reassure her on that score.

"Hi, Mrs Deluca," Max said, as they were waved inside. "So nice of you to... wow!" No effort had been spared in turning the DeLuca living-dining room into a fitting dance floor, from the extra speakers hooked up to the CD player stereo, extra lights put up, and decorations on the wall. Most of the regular furniture had been moved out, even. Max looked around, taking it all in, and caught the eye of Jim Valenti, Kyle's father, once the sheriff of Roswell until he'd lost his job by covering for Max's and Isabel's secrets at the wrong time - and Amy's current romantic interest, to the discomfort of both Maria and Kyle. Mister Valenti was also dressed up nicely for the party, as was Amy, Max realized belatedly.

"Alex, come on in," Amy was saying, meanwhile. "And Isabel... wow. That's - that's quite a dress, dear; be careful with those holes." Isabel just laughed at this comment, which was not a particularly good way of being careful with the holes - but then, in Max's opinion, if Isabel wanted to be careful, she would probably not have picked a dress with holes in the first place. Max couldn't make up his mind whether to feel that Alex was lucky or have sympathy for him - of course, the emotional disconnect that he'd require to stop seeing Isabel as his sister and view her through Alex's eyes made things complicated, and Max decided to not even try.

"Who... who else is here?" he asked. Only the six of them seemed to be in the living room area, as well as Max could make out through the unfamiliar lights.

"Well, Maria's around of course, but she's hiding out upstairs," Amy replied. "She wants to make a big entrance down the stairway once Michael is here." Liz nodded knowingly in agreement to this. "And, umm, and Ava and Rath haven't shown up yet." Something in Amy's tone made it clear that she still wasn't sure what to make of those two people.

"Right," Alex said from behind Max. "And what can you tell us about Kyle?"

"Umm, he's probably sulking in the kitchen," Jim replied. "May not be very good company tonight - for some of the obvious reasons. I... I suggested that maybe he should just catch a movie or go out for a drive, but apparently that was the wrong thing to say. He insisted on coming."

"Alright." Max said, and turned to Liz. A familiar song had started on the sound system - a song that had some odd associations for them, involving a horse on a deserted county road, and his first ever trip to the hospital, but there were no horses around here, so he should be fine. "Dance with me?"

"Whatever you say," Liz breathed, and effortlessly slipped into his arms. They stepped around on the kitchen side of the room, and Max felt more and more of his world starting to slip into Liz's big wide eyes. "I... I can't get over what it was like to communicate with the Granilith like that yesterday," Liz admitted. "Did... did you realize that we weren't talking in English?"

"What?" Max blinked in surprise. "What was it then, like the alien language - Antarian?"

"I... I'm not sure," Liz admitted. "It might have been a mix between our own human language and the internal dialect of the Granilith's computer - that would make an odd kind of sense." She sighed. "And... and it **knew** me. It called me by name, while it didn't seem to even understand that much about Alex and Maria. Did... did it know about that through Isabel, or from its own sources?"

"Couldn't tell you," Max said. "I was wondering that kind of thing myself, about some of the things Ava was telling it." He shook his head. "In a way, it almost seems a shame that we only got a look at what the Granilith could really do when we were in the middle of sending it away." He paused. "Maybe Tess never even needed Alex's help with that stupid book. If she'd gathered us all up into the chamber and used the crystal key, could she have triggered interface mode that way? Could the Granilith have told us itself what the book said?"

"Maybe," Liz replied, a little tense now that the subject of Tess Harding had been raised again. "But... but then she wouldn't have been able to control the information, like she could because Alex had done it for her secretly." Max nodded in somber agreement. "So... are you all packed?"

"I... I've got a few things ready to go tomorrow," Max admitted. "The thing is, I'm not sure what to pack for this. A weekend, a week away, I'd have some idea. But... but we don't..." His voice broke, and it was a few seconds before he could actually compose himself enough to speak. "We don't know how long we'll be gone - or even if we'll be able to come back."

Liz nodded slowly. "Yeah, I guess that's true. I've been struggling with that too - and with the fact that we're going to have to travel fairly light if speed is an issue. There's..." Liz gulped. "There's all kinds of stuff in my room, over my whole house, with enough sentimental value I can hardly bear to leave it behind, but I know that I can't take it _all_ if it has no practical value." Max was silent a long moment, unsure how to comfort her if just holding Liz in his arms like this wasn't enough.

Just then, though, there was a knock at the door, audible even over the music, and Liz pulled him back towards the stairway. "Maybe that's Michael," she said, excitement completely distracting her from the angst of packing, "and we'll get to see Maria's dress now. She didn't even show it to me!"

"Oh, really?" Max asked. But when Mister Valenti opened the door, it quickly became obvious that the new arrival was not Michael - but Ava and Rath, which technically made them two new arrivals - whatever. Rath looked very different from how Max usually saw him, dressed up in a formal outfit, and actually seemed startlingly similar to how Michael would have looked in the same clothes - mostly uncomfortable about the 'monkey suit.' As if to compensate for this similarity of demeanour, Rath had darkened his hair so that it was nearly as deep a brown as Max's own. Ava was wearing a little white slip dress, fairly low cut and a bit shorter than Liz's, though otherwise similar in lines - strapless and sleeveless. Amy seemed to disapprove of it slightly, but Ava didn't even notice the older woman's reaction. She rushed over to Liz and the two of them started talking very excitedly in a stream of rapid-fire questions and answers that Max couldn't quite follow, given the music. He smiled a little awkwardly at Rath, who just shrugged as if to say 'They're chicks. They'll come back once they've finished jawing at each other. Better this than Ava tries to talk her head off at me like that.' (Of course, Max might have been reading far too much into that shrug.)

There was more dancing once Ava and Liz had caught up, and then Liz pulled Max to the couch, which had been pushed into the first-floor hallway, mostly out of sight from the dance floor but still within range of the music, and the two of them started to make out furiously, indulging some of the passions that had been building up from moving to the music together more openly. Mister Valenti caught them at it, right when Liz had her hand down the back of Max's tuxedo pants and Max was managing, at the same moment, to nibble lightly on the skin of Liz's shoulder, (which meant that the two of them were in a slightly unlikely pose to make both of these activities possible.) Displaying an incredible level of tact and composure, Jim managed to discretely hint that they should either go back out to the dance floor, either to dance or mingle, or go into the kitchen, where they could grab snacks or keep Kyle company. Liz helped Max straighten himself out and they headed off to the kitchen.

The snacks that Mrs DeLuca had picked up were about as unwholesome as the things that Max and Liz had been doing to each other in the hallway, or more so - and nearly as delicious: original Twinkies, miniature glazed donuts, and little chocolate caramel morsels. But Kyle didn't seem to want any company, so they wished him a happy evening and headed back out, just in time to catch Michael's belated arrival, and Maria's much-anticipated entrance.

The dramatic tension was heightened by a spotlight that had somehow been rigged to start shining at the top of the stairs and follow her as she slowly stepped down each one. She was so brightly lit that Max thought the others who had been in the living room were probably having their eyes hurt to look at her. (The kitchen had been lit more brightly.) He had to admit that Maria looked very lovely in her black dress though - it was another fairly typical high school dance dress like Liz's as far as he could tell, with full shoulders and one of those vaguely heart-shaped necklines, a hem a little past her knees, and slits up the sides for both legs, though not terribly long ones. She was wearing black high-heeled boots, not too high, which seemed incongruous at first but somehow managed to work well with the dress, and her golden brown hair was severely straight and let down behind her. Reaching the bottom of the stairs, Maria stepped out of the spotlight, (which could only follow her so far, it seemed, and after a few seconds switched itself off,) embraced Michael and kissed him. "Glad you finally got here."

"Maybe I should stop showing up to this kind of party late," Michael replied with a big smile. "Did you wear those big boots so that it wouldn't hurt if I stepped on your toes?"

"That's one benefit," Maria said sexily, and led him off into the living room.

#

About an hour and a half later, the novelty of this party was definitely palling for Max, and even the sensation of having Liz dancing in his arms, her body moving against him, was starting to become more frustrating than exactly delightful. That was about when Liz leaned close and whispered, "I want to make an exit too. Can you ask Isabel and Alex to find themselves another way home?"

Max blinked slightly. "Maybe I can at that. You wanna get home early, and rest up for the trip tomorrow?" he teased her.

"Definitely not," Liz replied, which was about in line with what Max had expected. But what she said next was definitely _not_ expected. "I, umm... I actually made a reservation for us, at - at the tumbleweed inn."

"Wow," he replied. "Umm... don't you think that's kind of putting a lot of pressure on me?" Max grinned as charmingly as he could. "What if I'm not ready to... to-?"

"Stop it right there, bud," Liz said, her voice carrying a tone of sharpness that was belied by the love-struck smile on her face. "After what you did with 'she who shall not be named', you lost any right to be coy about sex - regardless of whether it was entirely voluntary on your part or not. I love you, and if I want you in my bed, I get you. Is that very well understood?"

Max blinked in surprise. "I like it when you go take-charge on me," he admitted. "Okay, I'll go find Alex and Isabel if you want." Liz swung him around to the side - Max had thought that he was leading, but that was probably as much of an illusion as any man has when he thinks that he's in charge of the girl that he loves - and Max bumped into someone else dancing.

"Oh, look - there they are," Liz said, giggling.

"Umm, yes, we are," Isabel said, her face frowning a little at the interruption of whatever private moment she and Alex were having when Max jostled Alex. Isabel lifted her head away from Alex's shoulder, and somehow he could tell that she had felt very comfortable there. "What is it?"

"Umm... we're taking off," Max said as firmly as he could. After all, Liz had made the decision - he was just following orders, hehe. "You guys can grab another ride back, yeah?"

"I think so," Isabel admitted. "Wherever **we** end up going next." The clear implication that Isabel, too, wouldn't be content to be separated from Alex immediately after the party was something that Max tried not to dwell on too much. "Have a great time, guys."

"Thanks," Liz told her. "Okay, I have to say goodbye to Maria - and Ava - and then I'll meet you out front. You go thank Mister Valenti and Maria's mom for us." And she kissed him wetly for just a few seconds, hurried off, and Max shook his head and went off to do what he had to do.

"I have to admit," he said, as they got back into the car, "that I never expected we'd have our first time... in the cheesiest, cheapest motel in the Roswell city limits."

"Actually, the Roadside is worse," Liz mentioned absently. "But tumbleweed was within my price range, and... well, my parents will be home tonight. So are yours. And - and I wanted to do this, before we left home. I don't know if it makes sense to you, that I'd decide so suddenly, but..."

"About as much sense as anything that came from the mysteries of the feminine mind," Max joked. "I guess something like this has never been that far from your mind ever since... since future me? I have to admit I've been wondering ever since you told me much about that part." That was one of the strangest things that had ever happened in Max's relatively strange and alien-infested life; for all that it hadn't happened directly to him. Last fall, apparently, Liz had met into a time-travelling incarnation of himself, someone who had travelled back from fourteen years in the future, from a time when he and Liz had been married, had been happy - until alien disaster had ruined everything, and they two of them, older Max and older Liz, had decided that the only way to 'fix' things was to split their younger selves up and encourage Max closer to Tess. That whole thing didn't make sense, except possibly in the 'they were desperate and wrong' category, which served as a sort of warning about committing to a strategy based on jumping to conclusions. Tess was nobody's saviour.

That thought suddenly gave Max a nasty enough turn that the car swerved slightly. Were they jumping to a similar conclusion by running away from home? No, he didn't think so, although it was hard to tell. There was a difference between committing to an uncertain conclusion and taking action based on insufficient information. Sometimes information simply **was** insufficient and action of some sort needed to be taken, and then, Max thought, you had to weigh the options, play it safe a little bit in the sense of taking the course of action that seemed to minimize the worst-case scenarios, and be open to new information coming in and other people's opinions that you trusted. Now, he was doing that. They'd gone over the alternatives - fighting, hiding undercover in Roswell, escaping by space, or escaping on land. Hiding the Granilith underground and escaping by land seemed like it would minimize the most notably bad possibilities, and he was staying open to other possibilities, as much as he could. They'd committed to hiding the Granilith away, but that was only because it was the best way of keeping away from the bad outcome of Kivar gaining control over it anytime soon.

Future Max, on the other hand... well, Max couldn't judge how much his time-traveller alter ego (and his wife,) might have weighed their options, or with how much care, but what Liz had said about their lives being rocked by tragedy around the same time as they'd made the choice to go ahead with this desperate strategy didn't say too much for the calmness of their state of mind. They might have been dealing with high stakes - with the lives of friends, but Max thought that tearing himself away from Liz had been a sacrifice of greater cost than he'd want to make. And no matter how much Liz had tried to argue with Future Max that there had to be another way, he hadn't listened. He hadn't been open to her opinion, though she trusted him and he should have trusted her.

"You're really quiet," Liz pointed out. "Thinking about Future you again?"

"Yeah, and about all the ways the lessons we can learn from his mistakes might apply to what's going on now," Max admitted. "But I think we're on about as solid a ground as we could be... Damn, **shit!**" So engrossed had Max been in his thoughts, he'd completely forgotten where they were heading, and just now realized that they'd missed the turn for the Tumbleweed parking lot, and were now sailing past the edge of the inn's property. Liz gently hushed him down and directed him through a circuit around a block of side streets, until they got back. Checking in at the front desk was, well, it was about as humiliating as possible... two obviously young people in formal regalia checking in for a room together, and all that. The guy behind the desk was discrete by habit - probably this sort of thing was old saw to him by now, except that he betrayed a bit of surprise that probably had to do with his ignorance of any school dance or other large organized formal event in town that night. And then they had the magnetic key cards, and found the room. Liz sat on the corner of the bed and looked at Max, a little bit nervous about the whole situation. Max pulled up a chair to sit straight across from her, taking her hand and hoping that what he had to ask her next wouldn't just add to the tension.

"I... I have something to ask you, my dearest darling," Max said softly. "It... it may sound weird, but this is about Future Max. I... I feel a little disconnected from all of this stuff about him, because the only thing I know about him is what you've said. Not that I don't trust you, but it's kind of a narrow channel of information. I can't picture what he looked like, or what his voice sounded like, or..."

"Well, that was on purpose," Liz pointed out. "He... he took great pains that I was the only one ever to see him. Especially great pains with you - because of that whole weird the 'two of you would explode' thing." Liz sighed. "So I don't know how I can..." She swallowed hard. "You... you want me to try to send you a memory of him? Pictures, audio, the whole thing?"

"Well, whatever you can get across," Max mumbled. From the very start, their connection had had the potential for direct exchange of mental imagery and other senses like that... Max had gotten pictures from Liz's mind when he'd connected to her, to save her life from a bullet wound, and the next night he'd reversed the process, showing Liz some of his feelings and impressions of her, which had indirectly led to Liz saving _him_ from exposure by Mister Valenti, long before he'd come around and become sympathetic to the alien kids living in town. Later on they'd been able to give each other 'flashes' through physical contact more easily and with less concerted effort on Max's part... but those had been few and far between since Future Max's visit. "You... you've been trying to wall that stuff off from me so long that it's hard to let me in, even now that you've told me about what happened in words, isn't it?" he realized.

"Yeah, yeah I guess so," Liz admitted. "For... for months I was afraid that you'd brush my hand and suddenly _know_, that you'd know what happened, and what I did, and then maybe all of it would have been for nothing - back when I still thought that what we did **did** count for something." Liz sighed. "That... that you'd be even more upset with me for trying to deceive you than you were hurt by the idea that I might have found comfort in the arms of another guy."

"Well, put that last part out of your head, right now," Max insisted loudly. "I... what you did was one of the noblest things that I have ever heard of. I... I **know** how much you always loved me, Liz. Even when things were at their worst between us, I never had any doubt about that." Liz made a gesture, and Max toned his volume down. "Even when I couldn't understand why you were staying away, through my confusion I was confident in your love, darling. But... but now I know that you loved me enough to let me go, when you really believed it was better for me. You might not have been right, but I am still so grateful for the sacrifice." He reached out and touched the smile that was forming on Liz's slightly pale face.

"And... and I guess that I've been keeping that deep-down and vulnerable part of me shielded from you in general, ever since Tess left," Liz admitted. "Because... well, how things went last year hurt me, and I don't want my heart to get hurt again." She sighed. "But... but we're here, in a way, because I want to make myself vulnerable to you in a way that's at least as important - because I want to be with you, to show how much I love you, and that does open me up to getting hurt too." Liz took a deep breath, and then let it out and a relatively calm, serene countenance filled her entire body. She opened her mouth to say something, but Max rubbed her thumb with his own without being directly conscious of the gesture, and suddenly there were no need for words.

He was seeing something completely different... a dim and uncertain view out through Venetian blinds, across a busy street, and to a bunch of tables and chairs that had been set outside the front door of the Crashdown - seeing himself and Tess, talking in a relatively friendly fashion and discussing a book that was sitting on the table between them. Tess was wearing a black top with a plunging neckline that showed off her perky, shapely breasts to best advantage, and the viewpoint suddenly shifted from the two young people to the building interior, on the other side of the blinds. Max could catch enough peripheral hints to confirm that he was looking out of Liz's eyes, and saw - saw his own face again, but different this time. Shaped by many years that Max could still hardly imagine, saddened by sudden and recent tragedy. His dark hair was long, grown out at the back well past shoulder length and incredibly full with a hint of curl to it, a few long locks hanging down around the sides of his face, with rough stubble covering the cheeks, chin, and upper lip, and wearing some kind of tough leather jacket. "We... we eloped," he said. "We were nineteen."

"Nineteen!" Liz's voice, from so long ago, was an incredible mix of surprise, disapproval, and wistfulness. "Wow, that is so young. That is **too** young."

Future Max's face quirked in amusement. "That's what **I** said," he insisted, "but you said that Romeo and Juliet were even younger than us, so we drove to Vegas." Max felt incredibly strange seeing this, and realizing that this Max had actually lived through what he was telling her about. He actually felt more than a little jealous of himself. They hadn't had to live through the kind of angst that they'd wished on him and **his** Liz, had they? They couldn't realize what it was like - how valuable what they were sacrificing really was. "Got married at the Elvis chapel," Future Max continued. "Congratulations, kids." That last phrase was somehow done in so perfect an impersonation of a really bad Elvis Presley impersonator that Max felt like laughing in the middle of the flash - and then he heard a soft chuckle from Liz, in the memory.

"So we didn't have a real wedding?" Liz asked, almost as if she were a television interviewer, prompting the subject for Max's own viewing benefit, while staying carefully 'off screen the entire time. (Of course, in this medium, Liz couldn't really have come onscreen unless she looked into a mirror.)

"Oh, we had a great wedding," Future Max insisted, smiling at the memory. "You called Maria, Michael, Isabel, and Alex, and had them meet us halfway. We spent the whole night singing and dancing in some dive outside Phoenix, and at the end of the night, 'I Shall Believe' came on the radio." Max wondered at that, as Liz must have worried about the reference to Alex many times since they got the news that he was dead. (Fortunately, the news wasn't quite correct, of course.) Presumably, without Tess in their lives, Alex had never had to go through that ordeal in the first place - yet another way that Future Max's timeline seemed to be preferable.

"I love that song," Liz told the stranger with his own face.

Future Max's eyes twinkled. "I know." And all of a sudden, the scene shifted away from the congressional office, which was where that first scene had had to be... Max had charged across the street a little bit later, alerted by a chance word from Tess that Liz had been involved in setting the two of them up there, and had argued with her in the office. He hadn't realized that Future Max had been there - his future self must have slipped away into another room to avoid him.

But now, Liz and Future Max were in Liz's bedroom, and as it happened were indeed standing next to the wide mirror that served as the door to Liz's closet and a dressing mirror at the same time, so that he could see the two of them in the reflection as if he were a ghostly observer, not looking out of Liz's eyes. "So we went to the concert," Liz was saying.

"No," Future Max replied through gritted teeth. "The night of Gomez I came to your room. That's the night that things between us were, umm, were cemented." He seemed embarrassed about that last word.

Liz's eyes widened slightly in surprise and confusion. "Cemented. So when you say cemented, you..."

"We made love."

"No, no, we...we didn't!" Liz's insistence about something that Future Max had lived through and that was still in her future, (and a future she might never reach,) was almost comical. Future Max tried to calm her down, repeating her name, but Liz kept talking over him. "No, I have no intention of making love to you or...or anyone else at this particular stage of **my** life."

Future Max was calmly certain. "I beg to differ."

"No. Making love to you is the farthest thing from my mind." Liz insisted uselessly. "I...I don't even have protection!" As if that was the clincher.

"I did," he admitted.

"Oh, that's great," Liz declared sarcastically. "There you are, Max the Saint, just walking around with a condom in his back pocket. I...I...I don't even care what happened in your reality. I am not making love to you or anyone until I am ready, and I am just not ready."

Once again, the scene blipped out, like a short movie on a videotape that had suddenly been stopped, and Max considered. Obviously Liz had reacted more negatively to the idea than... than he would have if he'd been in the same situation. He had never **expected** to make love to Liz when he went to her room that night, but he would have said he could see it happening if asked, mostly because his heart and his guy parts had been so twisted up with unfulfilled desire and longing that he'd been very aware of being close to a snapping point. He **had** been keeping a condom in his wallet, (in his front pocket actually,) and if Liz had simply admitted how much she loved and missed him, his own raging passion, unbound by those simple words, could have washed them both away. He oddly wondered if Liz had been glad of what they'd done when she woke up in the morning, or if she'd regretted things. Somehow Max didn't think that either of them would regret it this time around... and maybe that was worth some of the heartache that they'd had getting here.

One more psychic movie played out in Max's mind, (was all of this happening in just an instant of time? He was hardly aware of his own body, or of any time except as measured by his own thoughts.) To his surprise - this time the face was clearly Liz's - her hair shorter and in a kind of straight bob that was different than anything he'd ever imagined Liz doing, her face more mature and somehow even lovelier than he knew was possible. Max realized that somehow he must be looking through Future Max's eyes. Had he left Liz with some kind of psychic memory that she was now passing on to him? Was she aware of this?

What Future Liz said was short and very to the point. "Max, if you don't do this, we're gonna die. Everyone will. Max, you have to do this. You have to try it." What struck Max, more than just the words or the urgency, was the complete trust and intimacy that lay behind them. He could tell that Future Max and Future Liz had indeed lived many happy years together and had become very comfortable with each other, with each other's fears and worries. He wondered offhand if they'd had any children and what had happened to them in the invasion? And then the flash sequence faded away, and he was back in the motel room with Liz, she looking deeply and searchingly into his face, as if she was wondering what he'd seen.

Max's first impulse was to debrief her in considerable detail - or at least enough to make it clear to her, since the two longer sequences were memories that she was probably already familiar with once he gave her enough cues - the third she might or might not have seen already. But it then occurred to Max, that talking about anything like that could wait. Seeing all of this about Future Max and what he and Liz had had together in their other timeline - the first night of love, the impromptu Vegas wedding, and the good years together, had made Max realize how much he wanted something very similar himself. And there was... was no real reason that they couldn't, well, not except for the element of alien danger, which was going to be a factor in their lives no matter what, it seemed. All of the confusion and angst of the Tess saga had faded away, and Liz had brought him here tonight because she wanted to cement their relationship before leaving Roswell on an unknown odyssey. He thought that she was nervous enough with having instigated this entire motel business, and wanted him to make the next move.

That was something Max felt capable of doing, definitely.

He moved over to the bed next to her in one smooth movement, leaning in to kiss Liz and studying her face just to make sure that he wasn't jumping the gun. But her eyes, and her smile, were all screaming eagerness, and their mouths fit together like long-lost pieces of a single broken treasure. Max wanted all of this to be perfect for Liz, so he tried hard not to let his own eagerness push the pace too hard. They kept on kissing and kissing, and Max let his hands run over the bare skin of Liz's arms and shoulders, trying to warm her as much as he could this way, while Liz's own left arm wrapped itself around Max's back, supporting herself by that grip, while her other fingers played teasingly around Max's knee and his calf through the dark blue tuxedo pants.

Soon, though, teenage hormones would no longer be denied, and the two of them were lying side by side on the bed, Liz's wordless murmurs seeming to urge Max to pick up the pace. Daringly, he let one hand slip down to her chest and cup a tender, sweet orb through the material of her gown. "Liz," Max muttered, speaking almost directly into her ear, and then kissing her delicate earlobe for good measure, (despite the fact that there was an earring there that complicated the move slightly, "do you want me to take your dress off now?"

Liz smiled wickedly at Max for a moment before kissing him on the lips. "Yes," she moaned around the muffling effect of his mouth, "but don't stop kissing me."

Right - for any other guy, that might have been a problem, even a contradiction. For Max, it wasn't even hard anymore. As Max clinched with the incredible girl lying next to him, he concentrated on her gown, allowing his alien powers to become familiar with it, and then visualized exactly what he wanted. (Actually, this was a **little** hard, tougher than he had expected, but mostly just because trying to keep up this level of concentration during their making out was something that he had not really tried before. If it weren't for the prurient sensations that kissing Liz, and the way she was rubbing his thigh, produced - it would have been a snap. But he got it done anyway.)

The blue material of the dress fuzzed, then appeared to puff into fog, as all of the molecules that made it up broke up and followed individual courses for the air for a moment. The dress reappeared hanging up in a closet - that was important, because if Max hadn't made the dress solid again quickly, he would have forgotten which molecules made it up, and it was a dress that he thought Liz would probably want to wear again, especially since it was the only kind of clothing she brought to the inn. Liz smiled in appreciation of his special talents. "Maybe you should do yourself too," she breathed, panting.

"Why... why don't you try," Max said, hardly believing that he was saying it. "Ava says that you should probably develop powers any time now. Maybe all it takes is trying."

"Point," she said. "But you guys had some accidents first learning to control your powers, right?" Max had to nod agreement that this was true. "So I'm **not** going to experiment with a rental tux, and especially not with something like... um, short-range teleportation? Is that what you did to the dress?"

"Erm, it's a little hard to find the right term," Max admitted. "Call it molecular disintegration and re-integration?"

"Alright." Liz shrugged, which was a little distracting in her skimpy black underwear. Liz's figure would never be described as 'sinfully curvy' or 'voluptuous', to take two expressions for the sake of example, but her slender body with soft hints of womanliness at just the right spots was dominating Max's attention. "So, to return to the point - get rid of those clothes one way or another, boy, or I'm-a gonna rip 'em off you!"

"No you're not," Max said with a wink. "If you were capable of ripping them, you'd have tried the disintegration. That's probably **less** likely to damage them and cost me the deposit than the other."

Liz rolled her eyes. "Are you going to argue with me over fiddling little details, or..." But Max had already caught the point, and was using the same molecular disintegration trick on his own clothes - on _all_ of his clothes. Tuxedo jacket, tuxedo pants, dress shirt, undershirt, and underpants all vanished in slightly separate streams of aerosolized molecules, and reformed scattered over the floor and coffee table towards the other end of the room. Max was left sitting on the bed, naked as the day he... crawled out of a creepy-ass alien pod in the desert mountains. Liz raised an eyebrow at him. Max shrugged. "Figured I'd save a bit of time and do it all at once.

Liz's eyes grew wide. "Alright, then I'd better use the time you saved." She bent down and immediately put her lips to his chest. Max tried not to yell in delight and anticipation so much that anyone in the next rooms would be able to hear them.

#

Max woke up from a light doze to find Liz drowsily watching him. It had been a long and not particularly restful night. They had 'cemented their relationship' twice, as well as doing a number of other intimate bedroom-type couple activities that immediately sprang to mind, (like the one that they'd already done down in Corpus Christi,) and enjoyed a whole lot of foreplay, after-play, and possibly even some interplay. Max grinned a grin so big that he was a little bit worried his mouth wouldn't be able to take it without a jawbone cracking or something silly like that. "Hello, my love, my soul," he breathed. They had also enjoyed a number of unusual 'alien effects' during their love-play, somewhat like the flash stuff but more intensive, and Max felt that things had indeed fundamentally changed in their relationship. They weren't one person in two bodies or anything cheesy like that, but certainly closer than anything they had ever been before. It had **not** been anything like that between him and Tess, possibly because Tess had realized that she still needed to keep her clandestine activities secret from him and had been able to stop her mind or heart from opening up to him even in the act of love - possibly because Max had caught a subconscious hint of what Tess was really like and had pulled back himself. But that was enough of thinking about T-E-S-S at a time like this.

"Do... do you want to know what I saw, right before?" he asked Liz idly.

"Oh, yeah, sure," Liz agreed with a smile, turning around and arranging herself on the bed so as to prop her head against the side of his torso, using him as a pillow. Max smiled and put his arm down across her collar as a tender gesture. Liz was just as naked as Max was now, and neither of them felt particular self-conscious after everything that had happened, so Max had a good, if somewhat unusually angled, at Liz's nude beauty from the position that she was in, since she couldn't keep the sheets over her. "I... I assumed that you saw something about F-M telling me how they cemented."

"Yeah, and you didn't believe it, said that you weren't ready for being with anyone right then," Max said, and Liz blushed fiercely, which gave her chest an intriguingly pinker tone too. "Also, well, first actually was him telling you about getting married in Vegas." Liz nodded. "By the way, I wondered if future Liz - I mean, Liz from that alternate timeline, if she regretted that she and Max had slept together. I mean, obviously, if you were surprised by future Max telling you a few days beforehand, you probably wouldn't have been expecting it any more when it happened the, umm, the first time through."

Liz smiled. "Yeah, but... well, I guess you didn't hear this part in your flash. He also said that nothing ever came between them... between us - after that night: that we were inseparable up until the end. That certainly doesn't sound like I had a case of morning after regret." She sighed. "And... I guess I can see why not, at this point. It's like... this changes everything, but I don't see how I could possibly be upset about it or resent it, as long as I love you. And I was definitely still very much in love with you that week, as you yourself pointed out a little while ago. I might not have thought that I was ready then... maybe I wasn't, at least to the point that it was better to wait than not to. But that's not the same as regretting it after it happens."

"Absolutely inarguable," Max said. "By the way, there was a third part of the flash, which surprised me, because it wasn't about you... I mean, not really you. I think it was Future Max and Future Liz, from before he came back in time."

"Wow, really?" Liz actually sat up, turning herself around to stare more directly at him. "But... but how - well, I guess it's kinduv begging the question to say that something's impossible - when it comes to alien powers. We don't know nearly enough to say for sure. This whole thing doesn't really seem to fit any patterns we know about though."

"I... I was wondering if you got a flash from him of her, then maybe I could have inherited that flash from you," Max said. "But then, you probably wouldn't be quite so surprised at the idea."

"No, I never got anything from him - well, a dim sense, a kind of echo of our own connection," Liz quickly amended. "Enough that, well, enough that it reassured me he really was who he claimed to be. But it was like the connection between you and I was a phone line, but with him it was a bad connection, lots of static and random noise. Maybe that's because of the time differential between us, either in terms of our own ages or absolute universal time. That kept me from getting anything more specific from him."

"Alright," Max sighed. "Well, maybe he was able to give you an impression that you got on a subconscious basis, and then I got it from you, or maybe it came another way. I'm not sure," Max sighed and repeated that one sentence that Future Liz had said in the flash. "This... this may sound weird, but what if Max and Liz were... were being influenced by alien powers in the future, distorting their judgement? Someone knew that they had the ability to go back in time and change things, and wanted them to change it in a particular way that would work well for them."

"What, like a low-intensity mind-warp, the type that Tess used on you later that year?" Liz asked. "I... I guess that would fit, actually. Suppose we'll probably never know for sure now. I hope that if they did, that whatever they were trying didn't work out the way that they expected."

"Somehow, I don't think anybody could have planned out what's happened in Roswell recently," Max said, sitting up and gently pinching her leg. They leaned together to kiss again, and suddenly someone pounded on the door.

"Lizzie, I know that you're in there," a familiar voice called out, "with **him.** I give you one minute to make yourselves decent and open the door or I... alright, I admit, I don't know what I'll do, but the smart bet is that it'll really be ugly."

The voice was Jeff Parker - Liz's father. Max groaned. Of course something like this had to interrupt their perfect night together.

Liz sighed, got up and went to the room closet - hesitated, and got out two tumbleweed inn dressing gowns, instead of touching her prom dress. Once they had both shrugged into them, Max followed Liz over to the door and she opened it, showing a very angry Mister Parker, who was wearing shoes that didn't match, pants that looked rather like pyjamas, and a heavy black sweater. There was a moment of silence as his eyes went back and forth between them, a stunned expression on his face. Then Jeff immediately threw a punch at Max's face - startled in turn, Max tried to move back and roll with the impact, but when the fist actually connected, he wasn't at all sure if it had worked. He tumbled very unceremoniously to the floor, and only managed to keep the dressing gown from showing something that he was sure Liz's dad didn't want to see and Max didn't want to show.

"Come on, Lizzie, we're leaving," Mister Parker insisted.

"Oh, my god, _no_ Dad," Liz insisted. Max looked up and saw that she had stepped a pace and a half back from the door, and was rubbing her left arm as if she'd had to pull it free from her father's grip, (though probably she hadn't had to try _really_ hard.) "For... for starters, why the hell are you calling me 'Lizzie'? I'm... I'm nearly a grown woman, and my name is just **Liz**. And _nobody_ gets to tell me where I'm going or what I'm doing any more." She faced her father down intently, but with a trace of anxiety. "It was my idea to come here, and for what - I convinced Max, so sucker-hitting him like that is tremendously uncalled for! I'm... I'm sorry if you and Mom are a little taken off guard by this, and I really didn't want either of you to find out like this, but there it is." She sighed. "How... how did you even find out that I was... that we were here?"

Jeff Parker smiled a slightly bent smile. "I... I've prepared for this day. There's - there's a picture of you behind the check-in desk with a note to call me if you show up with a guy."

"Wait... wait a second," Max muttered. "If... if the guy called you when we checked in-"

"No, he didn't." Jeff shrugged. "Kids today. Apparently he just thought it was funny - told a bunch of his friends here working at the hotel, including the next guy to take over at the check-in desk once his shift was over. The replacement took things a bit more seriously - _he_ was the one who called me, about fifteen minutes ago."

"Oh my god, Dad," Liz breathed. "You're totally unbalanced right now. You - you should probably just go, Dad. Go home. I'll be back... um, sometime fairly soon." She sighed. "You've pretty successfully ruined the mood, at least. Can - can you just go now?"

She held her breath and waited for Dad's reply.


	3. Chapter 3: Abilene and Area

For a long moment Mister Parker glared at Liz from the motel room door. Then, speaking almost literally through gritted teeth, he managed to get out, "Liz, you're right that this is not the time and the place, so I'll go now. But as long as you live under my roof, I believe I get some say in how you live your life. To that extent, this conversation is _not_ over. I expect you to be back home by... by two AM." That was a little over half an hour away.

Liz stared him down too. "I... I think I understand your expectations now," Liz said, and she hurried over to Max to help him up. "Out... out of curiosity - those instructions with my picture - if I were getting married, with your blessing, and coming here for my wedding night - would you have cancelled the orders?"

Her dad laughed shortly. "Umm... no, probably I'd have forgotten them. I didn't remember it tonight until the phone rang." He sighed. "But I _wouldn't_ have come if anybody called, under those circumstances."

"Well, that's something, anyhow." Jeff Parker shook his head one more time and left in a cloud of frustration. "S-somehow," she blurted out, "that almost makes the fact that I'm not going to be living under his roof as of tomorrow a good thing."

Max smiled slightly. "You... you have no intentions of going home for two AM or anything like it, do you?"

Liz grinned. "God, no. I wanted to stay here with you... until Mom went off to church and Dad was busy doing his usual Sunday morning inventory in the store room. Then sneak upstairs and finish packing." She sat back down and looked up at Max. "What do you think?"

"Honestly... that I'd love the opportunity to hold you in my arms all night with a relatively comfortable bed under me," Max admitted. "God knows when we'll next get another chance." Liz nodded, and they started to snuggle up together and pull the covers up.

"Where... where and when are we supposed to meet tomorrow?" Liz asked, and yawned.

"One o'clock, Michael's place," Max remembered. "But if you don't want to be hanging around when your Mom gets back from church, I imagine that we can probably drive around and make sure that everyone who wants a ride over there gets one, and that nobody else needs help getting ready."

"Cool," Liz admitted, and hugged him tight.

#

"Oh my god, this is really a great motor home," Isabel admitted, looking inside the large vehicle that Rath had driven up. "I thought that something like this would be tacky... well, I guess it can't entirely avoid all the trappings of tackiness. Still, really not a bad attempt to..."

"Yeah, it's great," Rath said with no perceptible enthusiasm, getting out of the driver's seat door and heading towards a loose circle of people who were standing around the sidewalk and grass. Isabel, Maria, and Alex all headed off to explore the interior of the new vehicle more carefully. "So, are we all ready to go?" He started making a big show of silently counting heads. "All here I guess, except for the old folks."

"Rath, just where did you get that?" Max asked, frowning at the suspiciously new-looking RV.

"Oh, don't worry about it," Rath insisted "Paid for it, and that's all you really need to know, fearless leader." He squinted slightly. "Hey, who gave you the shiner?"

Max groaned. Last time he'd checked his eye, he didn't think it looked bad enough to worry about using his powers to heal himself, but of all the people he really didn't want to get a clue of what had happened list night, Rath was pretty high up there. "Never mind, it's none of your business." Max looked around. "Mister Valenti said that he'd be here in... um, in around three or four minutes now."

"Is he bringing Maria's mom?" Liz asked.

"Didn't say," Max admitted. "And Maria said that her Mom didn't give her an answer as to whether she was coming. Maria told her to be here, or call her before twenty after in case of an emergency delay - if she wanted to go." He took a deep breath. "Now - where are we heading?"

"East again sounds like a good idea," Michael suggested. "There's always a lot of traffic from this area travelling towards Dallas and Houston. Getting lost in those streams sounds like a good place to start."

"I agree," Ava put in. "Maybe turn a bit to the northeast once we've been through Dallas."

"Alright, sounds as good as anything," Kyle agreed, just as if it was his stamp of approval that sealed the deal. "Who's going where? What's our other vehicle, besides the motor home? The van?"

"Yeah," Max agreed. "Umm... doesn't really seem to make sense for anyone to call the RV - do we have any volunteers for the van?" Ava, Rath, Kyle, and Michael raised their arms. "That's a start. Michael, think you can persuade Maria to come with you?"

"Maybe possible," Michael agreed with a smile. "In the meantime, let's start loading luggage. No time to kill - the sky's going to fall in Roswell around night, and I don't wanna be anywhere around."

"It's tonight?" Liz exclaimed. "I thought last time they were already moving at top speed, when we thought it was going to be tomorrow around this time?"

"Michael is exaggerating," Rath put in. "But the point still makes sense. A day and night's drive away isn't any too much, compared to who we're going to have chasing us."

So everyone pitched in with stowing bags and other useful stuff in the two vehicles. When that task was about halfway done, Valenti showed up, with Mrs DeLuca in his car. Amy rushed around, looking for Maria, and hugged her tight. Max just happened to be close enough to hear mother admitting to daughter how scared she was of leaving home.

Soon everything was ready, and to prevent a repeat of the kind of shenanigans that had happened the last time any of them headed off on a road trip, Max pulled out a road map and agreed on their route as far as Dallas. They couldn't afford to get used to splitting up along the way this time - if an attack came, it would come suddenly, and they had to be ready to back each other up.

And then they were on their way. Max and Liz took the beds over the driver's cab in the motor home, looking out the little window at the road ahead of them... and very quickly fell asleep. When Max went up, he could sense that quite a bit of time had passed. He let Liz continue to sleep on, since she looked so peaceful and untroubled, and climbed down and into the cab - well, partially into the cab, since there was no room to really get inside. Isabel was behind the wheel and Alex was navigating. "How's it going?"

"Not bad," Alex admitted. "Van is well within visual range." He pointed a bit ahead in traffic and one lane over, where the familiar blue shape was also making good time on the highway. "We just passed through Lubbock, not quite ten minutes ago."

"Yeah, alright," Max agreed.

"Alex had an idea about stopping in Abilene," Isabel put in.

"Oh?" Max considered. "How good an idea is it? I mean, it's the logical place to stop for a meet-up, maybe get some drive-through grub before hitting the road again. I know a lot of people would like to have a sit-down meal, but it doesn't make much sense to waste that much time so close to Roswell." He sighed. "We might need to put more gas in this beast around the same time, too."

"This... this is more than that," Alex said. "There's a place I know in Abilene - specialty electronics supply. We might be able to pick up a few things there that'll help us keep ahead of any pursuit."

Max blinked. "Like what?"

"For one thing, a few useful software tools," Alex explained. "I brought along a laptop - we were going to occasionally try connecting it at an internet cafe or what have you."

"Right," Max agreed.

"Well, what if I can write something that'll immediately search the news services and tell us, within minutes, of any kind of reports that fit certain narrow parameters - stories that 'smell like alien involvement.'" Max whistled. "Yeah, also, that alien communicator - I'm starting to get a pretty good notion of the basics of how it's working - not the fundamental physical principles of how to build something like it, really, but... but I might be able to build in refits that'll give it useful additional capabilities."

"How... how sure are you about that, Alex?" Max asked. "I hate to say it, but I don't want you futzing with that thing if there's the slightest possibility of ruining it."

"Well, it's very slight, but I suppose I can't guarantee anything," Alex admitted.

"But we're stopping for this place?" Isabel pressed Max.

"Sure, I'll authorize it. Get anything you think might be handy," Max admitted, "but be quick about it."

"Alright," Alex admitted. "We should be there in, erm... a little over two and a half hours."

#

In the back of the motor home, Max carefully rolled two little plastic dice on the dining / coffee table. Despite the attention he had paid to the task, a slight shake of the vehicle as it moved diverted one of the dice into another plastic counter on the game board, knocking it down towards the floor. Jim Valenti sighed and reached down to retrieve Amy's 'guy.' "Sorry," Max said, shaking his head. "Maybe we should just be playing cards or something."

"No, I like this one, with its little trials and all," Amy insisted, and then sighed. "Okay, umm, that's five for you, Max." Max considered the current state of affairs, weighed the possibility of moving one counter forward five spaces and thus 'attacking' Valenti, and then realized he had a better alternative.

"Two." He moved one counter into a 'cave of safety', "and three." That brought his third active man up to a square that was highlighted in rosy purple.

"And he takes the challenge of fortune," Amy crowed happily. "Okay, roll one die only." She looked at the other side of the board, where the results of rolling each number on the challenge of fortune were laid out. "Four - okay, you can move your counter from the challenge to join any other counter in the active field." Max silently moved him over to crowd into the cave of safety.

"Hey - you can't move two people into the cave," Amy insisted hotly.

"Not normally, no," Max admitted. "But come on - the challenge rules said that I can join anybody else. That has to include my guy in the cafe of safety."

"I thought you could join your own guys in the cave through a normal move, if you like," Jim put in, and Max sighed softly at the three differing interpretations. "Hello, Liz."

"Hi." Max turned up suddenly, and saw that Liz had apparently climbed down from the sleeping crawlspace up front and was walking past the kitchen area towards them. She was dressed, like most of the gang today, very casually - baggy blue jeans and a loose floppy t-shirt with an old 'Peanuts' cartoon design on it, but Max was still blown away by her beauty. "How did you sleep?"

"Ehh, not bad, except for a kind of odd dream sense," Liz admitted. "What's this game?" She squatted down next to Max to examine the board.

"Something that we found in Maria's bag - I wouldn't have thought of packing board game sets, but it kind of makes sense as a worthwhile diversion with all of the long driving time," Valenti said. "Kind of like 'Sorry' with dice and some extra complications in the rules."

"Cool," Liz said.

"What was the weird dream?" Amy asked Liz.

"Just a second," she said. "I think there was some kind of argument over the rules, and that should probably be settled first?"

"I think, in this particular situation, I'm outvoted two to one - Max's move stands," Amy replied, sighing. "And if it comes to a question of moving a friendly peace into a safety cave via ordinary means, then again the majority of two stands, and the safety is disallowed? Sound fair?"

"So, because Max's position is squarely in the middle, we settle on that?" Jim translated. "Guess that makes some sense."

"It's not just that he's in the middle, it's just that you see everything in terms of the whole, but sometimes you need to break it down and evaluate case by case," Amy argued. "Well, never mind. My roll I guess." She picked up the dice, rolled, decided that she couldn't do anything terribly dramatic with the move - neither attack nor reach a special rules spot, so she moved along and passed the dice to Jim. "So..."

"It - it wasn't exactly a dream as such," Liz qualified nervously. "More like a kind of worrying feeling while I was... while I was mostly asleep I guess. Like somebody very big and not terribly friendly was watching me."

"Could be just subconscious nervousness," Jim replied. "Because you know about the aliens, you're worried about them seeing us as we leave town."

"Or... or maybe something more serious," Max mumbled, and Liz looked up in shock. "Well... we don't know what kind of powers Kivar actually has - if he has something that can work at terribly long distances, like Isabel's dream walking can. The sleep tie-in is, umm, is evocative." He sighed. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to upset you, just - we can't go into this with blinders on."

"Yeah, I understand," Liz agreed. "Well, come on - it's your turn again Max."

#

"Well, I think I'll go lie down for a bit," Amy said, getting up and heading for the alcove. The game had been put away for a while by now, and Max shifted on the couch, moving even closer to Liz if that was possible.

"Hmm... guess I'll try listening to the AM radio," Jim decided, getting up too and settling himself down at the kitchen table, putting on earphones and sitting so that he wasn't facing the two of them.

"Gee, it's almost like they're intentionally giving us our privacy," Liz remarked, with a little giggle. "Kind of nice I guess."

"Hmm..." Max thought about that. "I... I think that Jim would probably be up in the alcove with Mrs DeLuca if he wasn't so concerned with appearances - and if she'd let him, of course."

Liz laughed. "I don't think she'd mind - err, at least not as Maria wasn't likely to catch her." She sighed. "Somehow I suspect that sleeping accommodations are going to be a bit interesting on this trip."

"Yeah, you've got a point," Max admitted. "Especially with the urge to cover ground as fast as possible and stay away from Kivar - probably means driving through the night as much as possible, and sleeping in shifts so that those who've stayed awake all night can sleep during the daytime." He sighed. "I... I don't know if Skins need to sleep. Courtney never mentioned anything about that."

"No, I guess not," Liz said. "There was a lot about her alien side that she kept mum about - which I guess I can see why." Liz looked around. "Well, at least we're well off, and will probably have a good lead on Kivar. With any luck, he might not be sure in which direction to look for us straight off."

"Here's hoping," Max agreed. He wrapped an arm around Liz's shoulders. "Are... are you sure that there's nothing more to tell about your bad not-a-dream?"

"Hmm..." Liz thought about that. "Not the dream as such, but - well, I guess that all sorts of stuff have seemed to be tumbling around my mind ever since I got up."

"Really, like what kind of stuff?" Max asked.

"Like... like thinking that some important stuff is going to happen to us on this trip?" Liz hazarded. "Not... not just escaping from Kivar - and not like _not_ escaping from him, at least I don't think so. But... but maybe we'll meet other aliens, and find out other secret stuff. Erm, that's the big one." She sighed.

"No - no senses even more specific?" Max prodded gently. "I - I don't mean to put you on the spot, but I admit I'm curious." He sighed. "Do you have any idea where it'll happen?"

"Umm... maybe that it'll start with Dallas," Liz decided. "I couldn't say any more. Everything gets - um, gets kind of hazy after that."

"Okay," Max said, deciding not to push Liz any more, since a testy tinge could be heard in her voice - not a big one, but noticeable. So he kissed her instead. "Any idea if more of _that_ will happen on the trip?"

Liz giggled. "Oh, some - I'm sure. Probably... probably not as much as I'd like, considering the living conditions."

"It frustrates me to admit this, but you're probably right," Max admitted, and sighed. "Okay, we need something else to talk about now."

"We do? Is the subject of kissing already closed off?" Liz asked teasingly, and kissed him back. "That... that would be quite a shame." Max laughed.

"I don't know, I could wax eloquent, counting the ways that I love your kisses, but you might start blushing so hard that the couch would catch fire," Max pointed out.

"Right, I probably would at that. So you'll have to save that one for sometime I'm in less flammable surroundings." Liz sighed. "Well, what else is there?"

"Hmm... any idea where you wish we'd go on this trip?" Max asked. "I - I mean, I know we're not going to have time for much touristy stuff, but..."

"I, I don't know," Liz replied. "Right now... no offense to your company, but the only place I wish that we both were is at home in Roswell."

Max couldn't help but agree silently with that sentiment. It kind of brought the conversation to an ugly screeching stop.

#

"Hey, Max," Maria said about a second and a half after Max had finished dialling.

"Hey, yourself. Who's driving over there?"

"Umm, it's Rath at the moment - why?"

"I just wondered." He sighed. "We're going to be stopping for just a little bit in Abilene. Alex wants to go shopping."

"Oh, his computer supplies place?"

Max chuckled softly. "What, you know about... well, I guess you've known Alex long enough, he's had numerous chances to mention it." Maria agreed with a loud sigh. "So, umm... I'm not entirely sure how to handle things. You guys can follow us - or maybe we split up on separate errands - you guys could go pick up some food, and we'll pick somewhere to meet up."

"Just a sec, I'll check." There was a long moment of muffled voices on Maria's end of the phone that Max couldn't make out. "Negatory on the splitting up, we think - or at least not until we get there. We'll follow you. Do you copy?"

"Yeah, over and out," Max said, and hurried up to poke his head into the cab again.

As soon as the RV had pulled into the parking lot and come to a stop, a crowd of people emerged from the side door, grateful to have their feet on solid ground again. Isabel accompanied Alex inside, Jim and Amy went off to walk around and get some fresh air together, and Max and Liz waited as the van pulled up a few parking spots away. "How's it going?" Max asked Ava and Michael, who were up front.

"Not bad," Ava replied. "You guys?"

"It goes pretty well. We can probably take one or two more - the inside is fairly nice and roomy."

"Yeah, I kind of thought more people would be heading over there as we keep driving on," Michael pointed out, and Max nodded. Already the sun was very low in the sky. Would they be better off to keep on driving through Dallas before morning came, or wait there for a bit once they'd gotten lost inside the big city? "Better opportunities to try to get some sleep."

"And the fewer people are here in the van, the more those who are left will be able to stretch out and catnap," Ava continued. "Except for those who are driving and keeping the driver company."

"Alright," Max agreed. "Right now - we do need provisions. Just about anything will probably get eaten soon enough - burgers, fries, chicken, pizza, Mexican, Texan, Chinese. Candy, salty snacks - and drinks, but not too many of them, because we don't want to have to do too many bathroom breaks, especially for the van."

"Yeah," Ava agreed. "We can get started on the gathering food now - I just wanted to actually see you and touch base first. And we'll all be using the can the first place we find, too.

Liz surprised Max by speaking up at this point. "There's a drive-through pizza place just off the highway, at the east end of town. And also a gas station right near it, with pretty decent bathrooms. Makes sense as a place to rendezvous - in half an hour?"

The others exchanged looks. "Got it," Ava said. "We'll switch people there, if needed." Max signalled his agreement, and the van pulled back out again. Liz smiled slightly and Max turned to her. "How did you know about that pizza place?"

"Well, I've been on a few road trips out this way with Alex and Maria," Liz explained. "Never actually been as far as Dallas, but there's a honky-tonk in Clyde that Maria's done karaoke in. _don't_ ask me why she has to go quite this far to sing karaoke - it's a long explanation and I'm not quite sure if I remember it all."

"Okay," Max said with a shrug. "Do you know how much further a drive Dallas is from here? Four and a half hours?"

"Ooh, less, I think if the traffic is okay," Liz argued. "A twitch under three?"

"Then we'll probably be there long before too late in the night," Max realized. Guess we can look around a little while, see if there's anywhere interesting open - and then head on down the road... if we can agree on which direction to drive in."

"Yeah," Liz agreed. "Might be a good thing to try and agree on our next heading before we get there."

"I've got this faint notion that the northeast is our best bet," Max said, wrapping his arm around Liz and walking back vaguely in the direction of the store front doors. "Maybe even as far as Maine?"

"What, just because it's as far from Roswell as you can get without leaving the country?" Liz teased.

"Not that, though it kind of helps," Max admitted, "Also, well, we'd be passing through a lot more populated territory on the east coast." He shrugged. "We're running in the dark here - not sure what our enemies' view is like, but..."

"I know." Liz hugged him. "You're trying to do the best you can, just like any of us." She smiled. "I have to admit, I am feeling really hungry. Didn't grab that much for lunch before we left town, and even the package of peanuts I scarfed down an hour ago doesn't seem to be doing much."

"Well, you'll be able to pig out soon," Max teased her. "Considering that Michael, Rath, and Kyle are on the foraging/scavenging team, I think that they'll take me seriously about getting all those different kinds of food, and probably a few more." He sighed. "Want to go see how Alex and Isabel are doing?"

"Yeah, maybe we'd better," Liz admitted. "Make sure that he doesn't buy too much for us to lug around in the motor-home."

Max laughed.

#

The equipment that Alex ended up leaving the store with was actually pretty easy for he and Max to carry, though it certainly cost more than enough in Max's opinion, and when they got to the pizza place parking lot, there was no sign yet of the van. "Now we fill up the tank," Jim prompted, and took the wheel to drive over to the self serve station and load up on gas. The rest of them stayed standing in the parking lot, and Amy looked around at the buildings on this edge of Abilene and sighed. "It... it seems so hard to believe in what you kids said," she replied unhappily. "That an alien tyrant is going to be in Roswell by - well, by whenever, though he's probably still further from Earth than I can grasp coherently. The whole trip feels like an irresponsible pleasure jaunt." She groaned, unburdening herself. "And then, when I **do** believe in the danger, I start to think about my friends, and you guys' parents, and I can't make up my mind whether to feel worried about them, or just angry that they can be safe and I'm not."

"Probably the anger is better," Liz replied matter-of-factly, and everyone turned to stare at her. "Umm, I didn't mean on a psychological or moral basis, though maybe that's true too. Just - by the facts, the disparity is much greater than any actual danger to... to my parents, say." Liz sighed. "It sucks a bit that you were in the wrong place at the wrong time to end up finding out the truth about our friends, but it does make you a potential target in ways that the other people we know aren't."

"Just how does that work, Liz?" Amy shot back, suddenly directing her frustration at the young girl. "Just how, specifically, would Kivar come to town and suddenly realize that I know the secret, despite the fact that I've really given no public clue to it over the past few months?"

Max immediately jumped in to defend Liz - that was a response that he no longer even needed to think about. "We... we don't know what powers Kivar and the people with him will have," he said. "Maybe there'll be a telepath, or somebody with the power to search dreams, or some other way to find you based on your thoughts." It sounded pretty lame to Max, and what's more, it seemed that if Kivar had such powers at his disposal, then Amy Deluca staying behind would have been a relatively minor problem - well, except in terms for the danger to her, which was the point they were arguing. Nobody had said, out loud at least, that Amy was there because Max and his friends were safer with her close.

"Ohh, here come the other guys," Alex said at just the right moment. Sure enough, the van pulled into the parking lot in mere seconds, and about a minute later Jim returned from paying at the gas station. Michael had definitely lived up to Max's prediction about how many different kinds of food he'd get, and insisted on going through the drive through to pick up three medium pepperoni pies and a large vegetarian. Max caught Liz licking her lips once when she probably thought no one was watching.

"So, is anyone up for switching?" Maria asked. "I could really stand to lie down and relax somewhere a bit more comfortable than that back seat."

"What's wrong, had too much of lying down in a back seat recently?" Rath asked her, and laughed at himself. Maria glared at him, and Rath would probably have thrown a punch at his opposite number if Ava hadn't solidly swatted him and called him a Stinkron first.

"Umm, I guess we can take a shift in the van," Liz said. "Max and I got some sleep this afternoon... though I guess I got more sleep than he did." She turned those hugely expressive brown eyes up to Max. "That okay with you Maxxy?" She giggled as Max fought not to squirm at the pet name used in front of everybody.

"Yeah, that's fine," Max agreed. "In fact, I can drive, and you can munch from the navigator's chair." Liz grinned. "Okay, who else? Rath, Ava, are you with us?" A second later Max recognized the likely fallout of Rath's cruel tease about Maria and Michael spending a lot of time in the backseat. "Umm, I think we need a bit of time apart," Ava said frostily. "I'll be in the motor-home with Michael and Maria."

"Out of curiosity, just how many do we think we can squeeze in there comfortably?" Kyle asked. "Is, umm... is eight pushing it?"

Amy smiled at him. "Maybe just a bit, but I'm up for trying."

And that seemed to suit everybody. That would leave just Max, Liz, and Rath in the van. "Okay, you guys will probably want a bunch of the food," Max pointed out, "but you'll need to leave us a bunch too." The people who had been in the van and bought the food mostly saw to its division, with Liz asking a bunch of questions about what was what while trying to make it seem like she wasn't desperately interested.

Then Max and Liz, and several others, used the pizza place's washrooms, and it was time to go. "Did we forget about anything?" Maria asked. Max thought she looked a bit worried, the way the edges of her mouth turned down.

"I don't think so," Michael put in.

"Oh, we had something!" Liz exclaimed. "May not need to get an answer to this yet, but wanted to ask the question. Where do we go after Dallas?" There were several blank expressions. "Max was vaguely thinking about turning north by northeast and heading for Maine."

"Hmmm..." Ava considered that. "Will work as a plan A unless we think of something better, I guess."

"Gee, thanks," Max drawled.

"Don't mention it," Ava replied.

And then they were off again.

#

"Well, there goes Clyde," Liz commented between munches as the evening dimness crawled steadily closer. "I think that's as far as I've ever gone on this road. The rest of the trip to Dallas is unfamiliar ground." They'd just passed a small town along the highway and zoomed out into open plains again, leading the way for the heavier and less agile motor-home.

"Yep." Max looked over at Liz, a wide smile on her face as she dug into yet another slice of vegetable-laden pie. "Enjoying your dinner, I take it?"

"Yep." She sighed contentedly. "Love food in general, which makes it kind of strange that I'm so skinny." She popped a slice of tomato off the pizza, trailing a long string of mozzarella cheese, and swallowed it with gusto. "Guess you're luckier this way than if I were some plain tubby, huh?" The teasing laugh was plain in her voice.

Somehow Max couldn't take the comment with as much levity. "I'm lucky that I met you, because of your heart and your mind and soul, Liz... everything else is just happenstance." Liz looked over at him with her surprise showing clearly even in the insufficient light. "Yes, slenderness is appealing in a certain way, but I think I've started to realize that I see you as the most beautiful girl in the world because I love you, not the other way around."

"Hmm," Liz mulled that over. "First, you get full marks for sensitivity and sweetness for the basic point there."

"Uh-oh," Max muttered. He had a bad feeling about that phrasing.

Liz giggled. "Secondly, does that mean that if love were taken out of the equation somehow, that you'd be more physically attracted to a girl with a different body type?" Max didn't reply. "Like if I had bigger tits and curvier hips?" Liz prodded.

"I..." Max wondered if there was any way he could get out of this spot without making her mad. "Maybe... maybe a little while ago I could follow through that hypothetical, and take my love for you out of the picture long enough to look at my attraction to you dispassionately, weigh you against other girls or other possible versions of you. But... but I'm so in love now that I don't know how." He left the 'since last night' unspoken because...

"Oh, can I gag now?" Rath complained sourly from the back.

"Um, wait 'til we're done, please," Liz replied. Max chuckled and Rath made an odd strangled sound when it penetrated what she'd said. "Okay, I think I'll let you get away with that," Liz replied, sounding just a little dubious as to whether it had been literally true or an answer that Max had thought of to avoid getting himself in trouble. (Max wasn't entirely sure himself - he thought that it was at least half true, but...) "- as long as you answer a follow-up question. Have you ever had any sexual fantasies that don't involve me?"

Max opened his mouth, (aware of Rath in the back seat, listening, which altered his feelings about complete disclosure compared to if it had been just him and Liz.) But... "Why don't you answer that one first?" he asked as casually as he could. "Any that don't involve me, that is."

Liz considered that, folding up the pizza box and putting it aside. "Alright, I guess that's fair. Hope this doesn't puncture your ego, but the answer would be 'yes, of course.' Fantasies don't necessarily follow my deeper feelings, and anyway, there have been times since I've met you that my deeper feelings have been, umm... pretty conflicted. Do - do you want any details, and if so..."

"Um, a few names - doesn't need to be comprehensive, and no more than that, really," Max admitted.

"Okay. Kyle. Sean DeLuca. Mister Delgarr, from when I was in his history class sophomore year. Lee Daleman, that cute guy from the Roswell High soccer team last year. Michael. Isabel and, umm, and Kristen Smithee at the same time..."

"Sorry, _what_?" Rath interrupted. "Who's this Kristi girl?"

"I wish you wouldn't interrupt, man," Max said. "This conversation is difficult enough without the kibitzing. But, umm, since you asked, she's assistant captain of the JV cheerleading squad." And she was also tall, with a cliched cheerleader's lush, curvy figure and long curly chestnut hair. Max found the mental picture of the three of them together guiltily hot himself - not just because Liz was in it, and despite the fact that Isabel was his sister. "Umm, is that?"

"Err, I know that I've gone over 'a few' already," Liz said, "including some that may have been surprising, but I actually want to unburden myself of one more. Around New Year's, I was fed up with myself for still being so hung up on you and I deliberately tried to create myself a fantasy guy - with a name and a background and everything. I think Isabel happened to stroll into a very embarrassing dream that started off with me and Brad - the imaginary guy - and ended up with me and you."

"Oh?" Max tried to think if Isabel had mentioned anything like that to him. "Oh - that might have been the same night that she first found out about Laurie Dupree."

"Oh, okay," Liz said, jumping a bit in surprise. "Okay, well, it's your turn to answer I think."

"Umm... let's see," Max said, wanting to be really honest with Liz without upsetting her. Mentioning Tess' name in this context would _not_ be a good idea, and - well, he was completely unsure whether any stray thoughts he had had about her were his own fantasies or Tess' own attempts to manipulate and seduce him, so that wasn't entirely a lie of omission. "Maria, Shelby Prine, Kristen Smithee..."

"Ooh," Liz muttered, giggling nervously.

"Yeah." Max sighed. "And Joey Potter... that's about it."

"Oh, my god, I completely forgot about fantasies about TV stars, and movie..." Liz exclaimed, and the entire van seemed to sway a bit from side to side. "Okay, I won't get started on that right now."

"Much obliged." Max sighed. And there was silence in the van for a while, broken only when Liz reached out to pick up a cup and drink some soda through a straw. "Wait... wait a second, there was something important said a little while ago, right in the middle of the fantasies stuff." I... I can't remember what it was."

"Liz getting off on the idea of getting down with Isabel and another hot girl?" Rath put in. "I dunno, but that sounds pretty important to me."

"Shut up, Rath," Liz snapped, with the ease of long practice by now. (Max wondered idly if Rath was feeling a little upset that he hadn't made Liz's 'list', since he'd kissed her the first time they met - pretending to be Michael dressed up in a punk costume.) "Ohh - Laurie?"

Max gulped. "Yeah, that... that was it. We - we forgot about her, even though the plan was to bring along everybody who - who knew about our secret. What if she..."

"Everybody from Roswell," Liz pointed out. "Laurie's well away already - not as far as we're talking about going, but..."

"And if that's not enough?" Max muttered. "There are people who know quite a bit about Michael's relationship to Laurie, too - and who could say how to find her. My **dad** knows about Laurie." He groaned. "I... I think that we'd better call her from Dallas, if not sooner. Maybe - maybe she can get last-minute tickets out to Bora Bora or somewhere, with her inheritance money, enjoy a nice tropical vacation without anyone knowing that she's there."

"Hmm," Liz thought about that. "That could work." She seemed to be mulling it over in greater detail. "Why is it that, if anybody ever picks a destination that's supposed to be 'the middle of nowhere, completely unreachable', Bora Bora is more likely to get picked than any other place name, by like several times?"

"Umm. I don't know," Max admitted. "Should... should we call her right now, over the cell?"

"Probably not without at least giving Michael a heads up," Rath put in. "She's **his** sister, after all - he feels very proprietary about that relationship." Something odd hit Max about that. How did Rath know that about Michael and Laurie? Again, was Rath angry about being shut out of the connection, considering that the genetic link was at least as strong for him as for Michael, except that Michael happened to find Laurie first? "And, if you're thinking about other people away from Roswell who know the secret of all of us being aliens, I think there's another name that should be popping to mind. Anyone, anyone? Evans?" Max thought for just a second and shook his head in frustration. "It also starts with an 'L', like Laurie."

Oh, right. "Lonnie," Liz breathed. Short for Vilandra, Isabel's New York twin, and Rath's ex-significant other. Max still had a few grudges to hold against Lonnie, including the fact that she'd masterminded a plan to kill him, (Rath had been part of that caper too, but he'd won back some trust in ways that Lonnie hadn't.) On the other hand, Max didn't really want to see Lonnie getting captured by Kivar - if only because he was worried about Lonnie's instinct of self preservation, agreeing to tell Kivar anything that he wanted to know, even to help him catch the others, if he'd agree to save her life.

"Dammit." He sighed. "Do you have any idea where Lonnie's been lately, or any idea how to reach her?" The last time he has seen Lonnie, she hadn't been at all encouraging on the subject of further contact - and Max hadn't particularly wanted to press the point himself. But they'd said they might meet again 'if there was a great need', and this situation definitely seemed to fit the bill.

"I... I'm not sure," Rath admitted. "Last time I tried to track her down, I had several days to do it in. And I'm kickin' myself that I didn't think of this earlier, to give her a heads up when I knew that the big K man was coming here in person, but - well, it's been a weird time." Max nodded. They'd first found out the news about Kivar's journey to Earth not long after Rath and Ava had become an item. "There... there might be a voice mail box that she'd still check. I think I'm gonna try it right now, just in case."

"Alright," Liz said before Max could reply. "Any idea how much you're going to tell her?"

"Umm... hadn't thought about it," Rath admitted. "The basic situation, certainly, and about when we expect Kivar to touch down at or near Roswell." He took a deep breath. "Is - is it okay if I say where we are and where we're expecting to head, in case she... just in case she wants to know."

Max was silent for a long time, trying to make sure that he didn't crash the van into oncoming traffic. Once again, there was something unspoken that everyone in the van couldn't help but be aware of... that if Lonnie knew this stuff about where they were and where they'd be, she would have the option open to her to attempt a meeting, and then she might want to come along. Max wasn't at all sure how he felt about that. Lonnie was a devious, powerful and talented young woman, and she might be still holding grudges against Max herself.

On the other hand, to refuse outright would be to set himself up in a losing situation with Rath, Max felt, because there was very little that he could actually do to prevent Rath from doing it if he tried. It was pretty remarkable that he'd even asked for permission, but that didn't meant that he wouldn't go right on ahead without, thus weakening any authority Max might try to hold over him. So, Max weaseled a bit.

"I... I think I'd rather you didn't give that kind of information to a voice mail box, Rath, just in case" he said. "If Lonnie actually gets back in touch with you, then you can tell her. But it doesn't make sense to leave the information where someone else might possibly be able to get at it and use it to create a plan against us."

"Hmm." Rath considered that. "Fair enough, boss."

"And if you can wait just a few minutes before calling, Rath," Liz said, getting out her own cell phone, "that'll probably help, so that we don't need to worry about talking at the same time." She dialled. "Hey, Michael? Yeah. We've... well, the three of us have been talking about a bunch of stuff, and we hit on something that might have gotten overlooked in all the confusion of leaving Roswell so soon. Yeah, well, actually, it's about Laurie..."


	4. Chapter 4: The Pod Squad Does Dallas

"Wow, it's so bright," Isabel breathed, looking out the windows of the van. They had stopped for a very brief stretch and switch about an hour away from the city, and Isabel and Alex were now the ones with Max and Liz in the van - Rath having decided to take his chances that Ava's cold shoulder would thaw if he switched and followed her. Right now they were just coming into the downtown region. "I... I never really suspected that Dallas would be twinkly at night."

"Dallas doesn't **twinkle**," Alex said in a hilariously deep, manly voice with a trace of a Texan attitude. "Dallas may have bright shining lights, and occasionally it turns some of those lights on and others off, but that's not the same thing as _twinkling_. Twinkling is something that one of those fruity foreign cities like Paris or Milan does. I mean, I'm not trying to imply things but I definitely think that Milan has done its share of twinkling over the years." Isabel shook her head and mimed as if to swat Alex without actually making contact.

"That's hilarious, man," Max admitted. It had been a spot-on spoofing of a Texas manly-man who wanted to distance himself from something that he felt was a bit 'queer' sounding. "Okay, so, what's the deal? It's pretty late."

"We could go out onto a street corner and try to score some dope," Liz mentioned offhand. Several pairs of eyes stared at her. "Geez, that was a joke, of course. Considering how you guys react to trace alcohol and harmless Mexican exotic berries, I really don't think it'd be a good idea to smoke crank or take meth, or whatever."

"Of course," Alex said, "Strictly speaking, it might go the other way. Things that are harmful or dangerous drugs to humans might be good for people with alien DNA, even healthy. Maybe snorting some coke could turn you into super-aliens with, umm... like, five times the powers of..."

"_Nobody_ is snorting coke," Max insisted.

"Um, Max, what about..." Isabel was about to point out the window. Max wasn't sure if she had actually spotted some people doing drugs in public or was just bluffing, and he didn't really care.

"Clarification - nobody in our group is going to snort coke." Isabel made a little sound of agreement.

"Actually, it looks like a very nice and clean neighbourhood," Alex pointed out. "Not sure if you spotted anything in particular to make you think of scoring dope, Liz..."

"No, actually, that was clean out of the blue," she admitted. "So, we've got most of an hour to spend before the rendezvous." Mister Valenti had called to say that he wanted to try a few places to get gray market police equipment and a few other things that might help them keep one step ahead of any pursuit that manifested, and Rath also had plans for finding 'useful stuff' in the big city, so that running around was apparently going to keep the people in the motor-home busy for a while. Max had volunteered to switch around again so that the van could be put to use doing errands as well, but apparently everything had been sorted out and they weren't needed. Also, Michael had said that he thought it was a good idea for them just to drive around for a little bit without any agenda, and see if they found something interesting. He hadn't really explained any more about it at the time, except to say that it was a gut reaction.

"Yeah, we'd better find _something_ to do," Isabel put in, "because I'm going to be really bored if we just keep driving around. Let's see... all-night convenience store. Pass. There's a bunch of kids skateboarding on a half-pipe in the park. Gee, I'd rather not. Umm, Max? Hang a left."

"What, here?" Isabel grunted an affirmative, so Max put the brakes on gently, then more firmly, and managed to gently pull into the left-turns lane before coming to a stop. After waiting about thirty seconds for the oncoming traffic to die away, he turned the van down a smaller and markedly dimmer side street. There were city lamps illuminating the road, but they seemed to be set too far apart, so that things got fairly dim in between. "Alright, why are we on this street, Isabel?"

"I... wouldja kill me if I said I wasn't sure?" Isabel said. Max blinked.

"Umm... no, of course, you're my sister and I love you and could never hurt you," he replied. "However, if you don't start talking some more sense I might smash my head into the window." Liz prodded him very lightly by brushing her arm against his. "Not saying it's very likely, but... I'm sorry. You told me to turn, and you're not sure why?"

"That's exactly it," Isabel said distractedly, and with a brief glimpse into the mirror he realized that Isabel was at least as perplexed about the situation as he was... struggling to put something into words that wouldn't come. "It... it was just kind of a notion that popped into my head, without anything that I was aware of being the cause of it. Not quite a compulsion, just an impulse to go somewhere that was in this direction." She reached out to point to somewhere that they were passing. Tried to say something more, but Liz beat her to it.

"And... and it was about that nightclub," Liz said, her voice a mixture of confusion and odd certainty. "There's... there's something there that we _need_ to know."

"Okay, this is really cool in a... umm, in a vaguely Buffy-ish kind of way, though I don't think that they've done this sort of presentiment as such," Alex said.

"It's also more than a little worrying," Max insisted. "Girls... I, umm, I respect what you're sensing, but remember that... that aliens can do this sort of thing, can use their powers to induce thoughts in other people. Trust me, I know - and Alex, you know what I'm talking about." Alex's face in the backseat was suddenly stricken, and Isabel's mouth turned into a frown - she probably thought that invoking what Tess had done to Alex was a low blow, but he hadn't done it on purpose. "Maybe... maybe someone is trying to lure all of us in - by influencing both of your feelings. Maybe that someone was able to reach Michael, too, which is why he said that we needed to drive around."

"And why isn't that same person affecting you, or Alex?" Liz asked, not too confrontationally, just trying to solve the puzzle. "Just enough to keep you from being so skeptical, maybe."

"Maybe he or she is, except they don't know quite how skeptical I am, and they don't have huge amounts of 'juice' to throw around?" Max suggested. "It would make sense to go for you girls if heesh knows anything about us... maybe even if heesh doesn't. It would seem pretty obvious that the beautiful girls could get their guy friends to go along if they felt certain enough."

"Who the heck is Heesh?" Isabel asked, frowning. Max had put the brakes on and was waiting, a block and a half past the club. Uncertainly he crept the van around the corner, hoping to circle the area a few times to get a feel for the street layout if nothing else.

"Combination word for he/she," Max explained. "Because we don't know the right one to use. Never mind."

"Okay, here's another possible theory," Liz said. "You guys have your own powers, and you're not sure about the extent of them. Maybe there's some kind of power that's capable of detecting very subtle things, just below the conscious level, so that all the specific details are still unknown. All that Isabel can detect consciously, and even that's a strain, is the overall conclusion that all of these subconsciously acquired pieces of information is leading towards." Liz sighed. "And just maybe that's something that I'm capable of too, to a lesser extent."

"I don't like it," Max muttered. "But bottom line, our choices seem to be, do we go in, carefully and trying not to attract too much attention, or do we leave without learning any more about what's going on here, and if it's a trap, who was trying to draw us into the trap and what other resources they might have." He shook his head. "I don't like leaving in ignorance."

"That's the spirit, brother," Isabel replied with a smile.

"And you're right about doing it carefully," Liz said. "We circle around several times, varying the route and the direction we're moving in, to find out as much as we can about this area and make sure that nobody's following us. Work out multiple escape routes in case something bad happens."

"And, if we're not trying to attract much attention," Alex said nervously. "W-we should probably change into different clothes. Some thing a bit, umm, a bit more appropriate and fitting for clubbing in."

"I've got a few things that might help," Liz said, smiling and waving towards the luggage at the back of the van.

"Dammit, all my stuff is in the motor home," Isabel muttered. "And your clothes are never gonna fit me, Liz."

"They won't fit as they are, or even close," Liz agreed. "But I think that we can do some quick alterations when we need to."

#

"C'mon, guys, this is embarrassing enough without either of you playing stupid 'immature guy' games with us," Isabel complained warningly.

"Yeah," Liz chimed in. "I mean, it's not as if you can't get a good l-" She trailed off suddenly, as if realizing in a moment that she shouldn't say more that she could or would commit to.

Max traded a look with the other guy. He hadn't been the one who was really playing games - though he had accidentally walked into the middle of the situation in an unfortunate way so that it **looked** like he'd been just as bad. But it was really Alex who had been doing the mugging around and pretending like he was trying to catch a look at Isabel - or Liz - naked while they were in the middle of changing. Or was he just pretending? Max still wasn't sure just how far his sister and her boyfriend had gotten in terms of... of naked bedroom stuff, (shudder.) Then again, considering everything that had to happen for them to get together, and his sister's impetuous and take-charge personality, he'd be surprised if Alex, usually the more shy and reticent of the pair, would feel lacking for attention in that area.

And as far as Alex trying to sneak a forbidden glimpse of Liz... well, she was definitely hot, but they'd been friends too long, and Alex too much of a gentleman ordinarily for Max to really believe that was a sincere attempt. Alex was just acting out, trying to defuse the tense situation with inappropriate jokes. "Yeah, man, quit it," Max muttered under his breath.

So Alex groaned, and made a big show of standing before the front of the van, (which would have offered him the least chance of an illicit look even if he'd been looking towards the girls,) and facing outwards without moving, like a royal guard out on parade duty, or whatever the right term was. After a long two or three minute, Liz declared that they were ready to go.

"Wow, that's kind of an understatement," Max said when he got his first look. Liz was wearing black high heels, a black pleated miniskirt, and a white short sleeved blouse that was just transparent enough to give a hint of a black bra underneath it. She looked stunningly sexy, and the loose straight cascade of her dark hair, (which had seemed playful and casual before the change of wardrobe,) now accentuated the glamour of the rest of her appearance. And then there was Isabel...

Alex turned around just in time to catch Isabel climbing out of the back of the van in her new outfit. "Holy Anchovies!" Isabel giggled slightly. She'd curled her hair just slightly, and was wearing a pair of painted-on-tight blue jeans and a very brief red tank top. Her feet were planted into black leather boots, and gold glittered on her fingers, wrists, neck, and earlobes. "Good, I guess you like the jeans," she said, swaying over to her boyfriend and leaning over in a way that just happened to give him a good look down the tank top. "I would've gone with my leather pants if I had my wardrobe, but there wasn't enough leather to use, and that's tricky to try and make out of other stuff - I've never got it quite right." She sighed theatrically. "So we turned Liz's leather tube top into boots, and went with denim for the pants." Isabel looked around and smiled, checking that they were all accounted for. "So, in the front door I guess, and no lady leaves her man behind."

"Yeah, that should take care of the bouncer," Liz giggled, taking Max's arm and leading him towards the doors.

"Wait, wait just a second," Max said, though he didn't hold Liz up by very much. "Those boots were one of your tops?" Max had never seen Liz wearing anything leather, and his mind was going a mile a minute figuring out how much material was in the boots - they didn't reach very far - and rearranging it over Liz's upper torso. The resulting picture was certainly interesting...

"There was some leather left over," Liz said, taking a bit of the fun out of Max's daydreaming.

"How much?" Alex asked. "Was there enough for a pair of shorts? You'd look great in black leather shorts, I have to say..."

Isabel swatted Alex. "You've been spending too much time hanging around with Rath," she accused. "And Michael, and Kyle, come to think of it..."

The conversation ended at this point, as they came up to the short line that had formed, waiting for the burly doorman's permission to enter. This was obviously not being done on a first come first served basis, and Max thought briefly of making a scene when they were picked to enter ahead of people who had been there for longer, but decided that this was not the right time to fight the system, especially as it was working in their favour.

The nightclub interior was very different from the few dance clubs that Max had ever gone to in Roswell or nearby towns, and seemed to him like a distillation of everything bad he'd ever heard about the nightlife scene - too loud, too crowded, too smoky, too skanky, too tasteless, too dim in the corridors and around tiny tables, and too brightly lit and disorienting out on the dance floors. "So," he said into Liz's ear in a voice that he hopes was loud enough to be heard over the music and the din of other people trying to talk over the music, and not loud enough to be made out clearly by anybody else, "Does your intuition have any other instructions now that we're here?"

"Not yet," she admitted in a clear voice. "But intuition is like that - it never responds at all to cross-examination, just sits there with infuriating calm, humming softly to itself." She looked around the crowded club. "But if I act like I'm not paying any attention to it, then it'll come up with some other cryptic thought in a few minutes. Maybe in the meantime we should try to circulate, see as much and as many people as we can, just in case something relevant is spottable."

Isabel and Alex couldn't possibly have heard what they were talking about from a few feet away, but neither seemed to mind the idea of pushing through the crowd in the direction that Liz attempted to lead. When Max turned to check that they were still all together, he could see Isabel and Alex talking about something that **he** couldn't understand. Just great.

After circling around the edge of the dance floor, getting propositioned about five times in total among the four of them, they finally made it to a small refreshments counter. "_Remember_!" Alex announced in a voice loud enough that they, and several people near them could recognize, "**Don't drink anything that you don't recognize.**" Max nodded, seeing the wisdom of the advice. As he had mentioned while they were driving into the city, alcohol had an unfortunately heightened effect on hybrid blood chemistry or something, so that they could get drunk on a tiny amount of it and stay intoxicated for a long time - and the last and only time Max had gotten drunk, without knowing about this effect before he chugged a small amount of Kyle's Kentucky bourbon, he hadn't cared much about keeping the alien secret. Isabel had never been through that, as far as Max knew, and he would be quite happy with things staying that way.

Other unusual ingredients could have even worse effect. In Corpus Christi, Ava had accidentally had a few glasses of something that had an exotic Mexican fruit as its main ingredient, and had fainted, her system nearly poisoned by a chemical present within the fruit juices that was completely harmless to humans. (As opposed to alcohol, which was a mild poison even for Homo sapiens.) So they managed to order some ridiculously overpriced sparkling water and brand name soft drinks, and continued on past the bar into more crowded and dim corridors.

The music was less relentlessly loud here, and the conversation and hubbub of people seemed to make up for it, surrounding them from every possible direction. A cute girl, a little on the short side with a lopsided mane of platinum blonde hair, bumped into Alex, looked up at him, and smiled with a recognition that was completely one-sided. "Kenny! I've been looking for you, man. Here's the stuff."

Alex was surprised enough that he didn't recognize until the girl had finished pressing a package, wrapped in brown paper bag, into both his hands. "Wait a second - my name's not Kenny, I don't know you, and I definitely don't want any stuff!"

"Come on, Kenny, quit playing games, I'm too wasted for it. You paid for this stuff, you'd better take it."

"_I didn't pay for it_!" Alex exclaimed, sounding overwhelmed with the strangeness of the situation. "So..."

"Let's cut to the chase," Isabel announced, stepping forward, taking the package. "You had better take this back, or I will shove it up your ass the most obvious way. You're wasted, so please take into account that your sense of recognition is badly distorted. Maybe you should leave and sleep whatever you took off somewhere, I don't know." Somewhat uncertainly, the girl accepted the bag when Isabel passed it back. "Now, please get the hell away from Alex. Not Kenny." Isabel looped an arm around his. "_my_ Alex. Got it?"

"Umm, sure," the stoned girl muttered unsteadily. "Sorry for any convenience." She took two steps, tripped and fell onto a couch, where she was helped into a sitting position by a guy who'd been watching the altercation and grinned quite wide. Max had a bad feeling about that too, but unfortunately the girl wasn't his responsibility. He wondered vaguely whether the grin was about the girls' good looks and relatively compliant state of mind, or the brown bag that she wasn't sure how to get to Kenny, or both.

Dwelling on such thoughts, he almost missed the snipped of conversation when he heard it. The speakers weren't far away, but... "Come on, man. There must have been something you were missing. A trap door in the floor - or the ceiling."

"If there was, I tell you, it must have been built by one of those guys who did secret passages and hidden doors in the castles of Europe, because I checked the whole place after she was left and didn't find anything. In walks an old lady - gray hair, walking like she needs a cane and left it behind, and she goes into the store-room, there's a peculiar noise from inside, and then, out comes a gorgeous redhead, couldn't have been more than twenty-two and dressed to kill. Was like one of those old jokes about a country yokel coming to the big city, seeing an old man go into an elevator, and a young handsome lady-killer walk out next - except that this room was definitely not an elevator."

"Come on, you're pulling my leg." Pause. Max reached out to nudge Liz, but she had frozen and was clearly listening to the same conversation. "Why didn't you go up to the girl and ask her... I don't know, ask her something?"

"Like what, 'how did you give yourself a full-body makeover so fast?'" Both guys talking - they were maybe thirty-something, very hiply dressed and drinking from big plastic cups, probably beer - laughed uncomfortably. "To tell you the truth, I was too startled, and wondering if I had dreamed it, to say anything until she was long gone. That's when I went into the supply room to check for other doors into our out of it." He sighed. "It... it was like one person had teleported out of the room and another arrived."

"Or like Clark Kent going into a phone booth and Superman coming out, I suppose."

Apparently, that was the last straw. "Excuse me, I didn't mean to eavesdrop," Isabel, stepping forward towards the two guys who had been sharing the story. "Couldn't help overhearing, and my, umm, my friend and I just love weird modern folktales like that. Where and when did you hear that one?" Max smiled slightly at Alex, and they melted back into the crowd a little, letting Liz step up, so that the two girls could work their collective charm on the marks unimpeded.

"Hey, it's not an urban folktale!" the second guy protested - just as Isabel had been trying to prod him into doing, Max knew. "It really happened, and the person it really happened to is me, in Louisville, Kentucky, this morning."

"Right..." Liz said. "You were in Louisville this morning, and now it's, umm, it's a little after nine thirty and you're in Dallas?"

"I'm a courier," the guy insisted, answering the unspoken question. "Travelling long distances quickly is part of the job. It's not that long a drive down from Kentucky - I was in Dallas around seven thirty. Made my drop, and then I decided to go out and have a good time before checking into a hotel." He shook his head. "Tell her, man."

"Well, he's a courier, all right," the other guy confirmed. "Not sure about the details of today's run. He called me about half an hour ago to see if I could come down and we could cruise for pretty ladies together." Max noticed Liz trying not to roll her eyes in frustration.

"Okay, okay, maybe we believe you," Isabel said. "Where in Louisville, then? Where exactly was this supply closet?"

"Umm... it was where I was picking up the package," he said, a little slowly. "But... but I'm not sure I should be telling any more about it to some strange girl that came up to me in a club." The guy smiled a very inviting smile. "On the other hand, if we sit down, have a drink, hang out together a bit - then we wouldn't be strangers anymore, now would we?"

Isabel hesitated only a moment. "Well... I've already got a drink," she pointed out, waving it in her hand slightly, which did make her chest sway back and forth ever so slightly. "Though I wouldn't mind having another one in a little bit, I suppose. And I don't really feel like sitting down at a table... do you? I... I feel all this energy, a kind of restlessness." She smiled big. "Maybe we can go out and dance in a bit... but not yet. We can't talk out on the dance floor - the music's _way_ too loud there."

Max watched very carefully, wanting to make sure that his sister didn't get into trouble with these strange guys... or his true love, for that matter. Also, he was trying to get a handle on them in terms of their intentions, to fathom if they were any more than they seemed. If the impulses driving the girls towards the club had been part of a trap, then maybe the conversation had been a setup - something that they had been meant to overhear. But looking at them, Max couldn't get himself to believe that either guy, especially the one who had been telling the story, had an ulterior motive. They were just single men out for some fun and more than a little bit on the prowl. That meant... that the girl that he saw could have been an alien shape-shifter, or been using powers in some other way. How would such an individual play into the wider situation as they knew it? Was she an advance agent of Kivar? Or... well, it was hard to even guess at this point.

"You're... you're quite the tease, aren't you?" The guy said, staring Isabel up and down, and grinning at what he saw. "No - no matter what I tell you or don't tell you, you're not really going to dance with me, are you, scheming vixen?"

Isabel hesitated visibly, and apparently decided to go for the truth. "No, I guess not. For one thing, umm - my friend wouldn't like it that much." She nodded a head in the direction of Alex, though not particularly close. The guy seemed only a little disappointed. "But on the other hand, if you tell me what I want to know - maybe it'll give you good karma, and that'll improve your luck with some other beautiful girl who's here tonight looking for a hot time." She sighed. "Or maybe it'll bring you pleasant dreams tonight."

Alex's eyes widened at that point, but a moment's thought reassured him that Isabel wasn't likely to dream-walk this guy - though she might have figured out some way of 'giving' him an impressively erotic dream without being so personally involved in it, since that would sort of be dream-cheating on Alex. "Okay, babe, what the hell. It's the Wilson brothers office on Southshire street... they're some kind of contractors, or sub-contractors - I don't really know that much about the company. I'm a hired gun, work for all sorts of places. My central office is in Memphis, and..."

"Yeah, yeah," Liz broke in. "What about the woman, did you ask anyone there if they knew about a woman like that? Either woman, I guess - the younger one or the old lady?"

"Actually, I did. Nobody could say much about the cutey, though several other guys who worked there were very interested in hearing more about my description." Isabel laughed wryly. "Somebody said that the older lady sounded like a temp secretary who'd been working there for a few days, but... well; I needed to get on the go quickly, so I couldn't ask any more." He sighed. "That's about all that I can tell you."

"Yeah, I suppose so," Isabel agreed. "Well, here you go, and I hope you don't regret helping us." She tapped the guy near where his shoulder met the rib cage, and he stiffened - Max could feel the faint trace of some sort of power passing from Isabel into her informant. "Have a great night."

Guy shared a confused look with his friend, and they headed off towards the dance floor. They didn't get more than seven or eight feet before getting stopped and chatted up by a pair of tall, leggy brunettes who looked like they could be sisters. Hmm. Liz looked a question at the others.

"Wait a bit," Max said, and led them further on through the hallway. As he had guessed, after a few dark twists and turns, it opened up on another loud, incessantly flashing dance floor. Here they could talk in more privacy, under the cover of the music, if they were careful abut it. "So - do we plan to go to Louisville?"

"Isn't it in the direction we already planned to go?" Liz asked.

"Not... not quite," Alex replied, bopping a bit in place as they all waited on the edge of the dancing. If they waded in among the throng, it would get very hard to even talk to each other. "A straight course for, say, Augusta Maine, would send us a little bit east of Kentucky. I'm not sure of the exact route. But it's not too far out of our way."

"Unless we think it's a dangerous trap, we should definitely give it a try," Isabel said. "Max..."

"I'm in favour," he replied. "I was trying to get any possible deceptive vibe off of those guys, and there wasn't anything. They were on the level."

"Which guys?" Max whirled around, horrified that they'd been overheard in turn. But the face that smiled up from behind was a familiar one. _Too_ familiar in some respects, and Max nearly panicked before realizing that it was Ava.

"Umm... that's hard to explain quickly. What're you doing here?"

"Trying to get where the action is," Ava said with a merry grin. "Liz, I love the skirt! It's very daring without taking all the mystery out."

Liz laughed. "You look great too, girl." Max nodded absently, trying to think of when he'd seen Ava in that same aqua-blue minidress before, and then the memory of that ill-fated night that she'd overdosed on Spanish berries came back to him. She must have taken care to clean it, because the outfit hadn't looked nearly as good when they were carrying her home to the flophouse hostel as it did now. "But... well, how did you get here?"

"Umm, Rath dropped me off a few blocks away. I could, umm, could intuitively tell that there was something important going down here, and plus, Rath was still getting on my nerves so I thought it made sense to take off." Ava sighed. "Whatever it was, did I miss it?"

"I'm thinking yes," Alex replied, "unless there's more to come." Leaning close, he whispered close to Ava's ear, and even though Max strained to hear, all he could pick out were a few words. "Eavesdrop... shifter. Isabel... whammy - karma." Well, at that level they really wouldn't need to worry about anyone else hearing, at least.

"Ahh, okay," Ava said, "You can fill me in more later." She sighed. "How about some dancing?"

"You don't have a partner here, Ava," Isabel pointed out with a soft laugh.

"Like that ever stopped me before," Ava shot back. "Don't worry - I'm not gonna steal yours or anything." And with that, and a few shrugs, the group headed out into the busy crowd of dancers. Isabel bopped along in rhythm with Alex, and Max danced close with Liz, putting his arms around her some of the time even though the music wasn't a slow dance. Ava sometimes danced all by herself, and picked up a few partners from among the strangers.

A few songs later, still in his arms, Liz closed her eyes for a second and gasped in a way that was somewhat familiar by now. "What - what is it?" Max whispered in her ear.

"I... I'm not sure," Liz muttered, pressing herself closer to him without commenting on it. "I... okay, somebody bumped into me from behind. Did you notice them?"

"Umm... no, I can't say that I did," Max admitted unhappily. "Was concentrating too much just on you I guess."

Liz smiled slightly, and whispered in his ear, which required her behind Max's head down to the level of her own. "I... I had a flash, yeah. Of - of my grandmother."

"Grandma Claudia?" Max said, smiling.

"No, I saw my grandmother on the other side. That is, my mom's mother - Granny Brant."

"Hmm." Max thought about that. "You've... you've never mentioned her."

"No, I didn't think I did." Liz's own voice sounded more than a little puzzled that the subject had come up now. "I've never met her, Max. Mom's showed me a few pictures, told me a very little about her, but that's it. She... she died when I was still a baby too young to remember her." Liz sighed. "A few times when I was growing up, Mom and I would fly out to visit Gampa Brant in Portland, while Dad took care of the cafe. But he passed away too, when I was nine and a half."

"Hmm." Again, Max considered. "Do you want to look for whoever bumped into you, find out if they have any connection to the Brants?"

"I... I'm not sure how we'd tell, Max." He realized that they'd been circling around, so that Liz could scan the crowd of more energetic dancers around them. Once again, Liz had been taking the lead, and he hadn't even realized it. "I... I think I just want to get out of here, as quickly as possible. We've got what we came here for, even if we don't understand it."

That line puzzled Max. Was Liz hinting that this flash about her grandmother was part of whatever had been intuitively drawing them to the club? Did that mean that the shape-shifter thing _hadn't_ been, or that they were connected? But he didn't argue or resist Liz's suggestion, and in fact did everything he could to round up the others, (they had drifted apart from each other a bit during the dances,) and lead the way back to the main entrance. The bouncer made a remark about how it was a shame that such pretty ladies weren't sticking around for any more fun, and Ava flirted with him a little until everybody else's line of escape was secure.

As they hurried back to the van, Liz told them very briefly that she had had a flash. Alex started the van and they drove off towards the north side of town, which was where they had a rendezvous with the rest of the group - but not for about an hour yet. "How... how much do you know about your grandmother Brant, Liz?"

"Umm... not sure," Liz admitted. "Her first name was Evie - short for Evelyn, and I think her maiden name was Roberts. Her family was poor when she was growing up - never really climbed out of the depression, even during the war, and she and my Gampa lived here in Roswell for a long time before his job took him up Northeast. My mother was on a summer trip back to Roswell when she met my Dad."

"What was his job?" Ava asked.

"Umm, Gampa was a firefighter, actually," Liz said. "That... that's about as much as I can remember offhand. Doesn't seem like very much, does it?"

"Well, it's not like you ever really got a chance to get to know her very much," Alex admitted. "I know that I'd have had a hard time asking my mom about a grandparent who'd died when I was that young." He took a deep breath. "Okay, where are we off to next?"

"Someplace that we can relax in some peace and quiet," Max suggested, to very faint cheers of approval.

"And maybe grab some grub," Isabel put in.

"What, didn't you get enough of the pizza and the chicken fingers?" Ava asked.

"Nah, not really, just sufficient to whet my appetite for more," Isabel admitted. "Though I was slow getting to the grub, I admit - and then it was all gone."

"Well, we can definitely go to a burger place or something," Liz assured her. "Sounds like a nice place to unwind after time on the road I guess - as long as they don't throw us out after twenty minutes or so."

"Just let 'em try," Max joked.

#

"Let's see," Alex said, spreading the map out over a large stretch of table, much to Ava's annoyance because part of the stretch was the place that she'd been keeping her double bacon cheeseburger with extra pickles, ketchup, and Tabasco. Alex bent over to examine the routes in the area of Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Tennessee, and Kentucky. "Starting at Dallas, trying to get to Louisville, I guess it's through Little Rock, Memphis, and Nashville. Probably would keep us going through all the night and a lot of the morning, but we'd get there before noon as long as we start soon after the agreed-on rendezvous."

"Yeah," Max agreed, not paying that much attention to the map. "Personally, I might have gone through Louisville even if we hadn't gotten this tip, but then again maybe not. Continuing east from Nashville, into Virginia would probably be faster I guess."

"Yeah, it's a little hard to tell," Alex admitted. "When I get back to the motor-home, I can fire up 'Streets and Trips' on the laptop and see what it says. If anything"

"Why not hit MapQuest, or yahoo directions?" Ava asked.

"Because we don't have a mobile internet connection," Isabel pointed out, and Ava nodded. "If I understand right, streets and trips doesn't have as good or thorough a database, but it's self-contained, so that we can run it ourselves."

"Pretty much, or something like that." Alex yawned. "Hmm... did you have anywhere in particular in Maine in mind, Max?"

"Not really," he said. "After all, if we're going to be chasing down shape-shifters, we might not even get to Maine. That's hard to say." Max sighed. "Probably somewhere as far northeast as possible without running right up against the ocean or the Canadian border. Why do you ask?"

"Oh, no big reason, just wondered," Alex said. "I mentioned Augusta earlier, but if I'd remembered about Bangor, I'd probably have said that instead... several times." He laughed softly. "It's just so fun to say. Bangor, Maine. _**Bangor**_**, Maine**..."

"Okay, quit it," Isabel muttered.

"I'm reluctantly quitting it - for now." Alex idly picked up a menu and put it over top of the map. "Eww!"

"What?" Liz asked, frozen in the act of bringing her hamburger to her mouth. "What... what is it Alex?"

"There's _haggis_ on the menu!"

"Umm, so? It's a bit weird, but..."

"Sorry, Liz, but I've got to agree with Alex that it's an 'eww,'" Isabel replied, shuddering for several seconds. If she'd still been wearing just her clubbing tank top, this would have been a sight to make Max very uncomfortable, but she'd put a sweater on over top just before getting out of the van in the 'Pit of barbecue' parking lot. "Haggis is just plain nasty. Who'd be eating haggis in Texas? Who'd order Haggis at a hamburger diner?"

"And who'd order hamburgers at a hamburger diner, knowing that there are Haggis ingredients in the building," Ava chimed in.

"Ava!" Liz exclaimed.

"Okay, okay, I won't harp on that part," Ava said... and took a very big and careless bite of her own burger. Liz shook her head in disbelief for a long moment, and then squeezed closer to Max as if she was in need of reassurance, putting her own sandwich down and not touching it. Max wrapped an arm around Liz's shoulders affectionately, and smiled at her.

"It'd be fun to see a big, muscular cowboy type, with the hat and the boots and all, bring a haggis over to his table and cut it open, though," Alex admitted after a long silence.

"Definitely they make good burgers, though," Ava said, still attacking her double bacon delight with gusto. "Probably you couldn't find a better burger from here to Laredo." She noticed Max staring at her. "What?"

"Just, for a second, you sounded like you were in a commercial for the Pit of Barbecue," Max told her.

"Ohh, if they do commercials, they should totally have Pinky and the Brain in them," Alex said. "'Cause of that one where they were back in the middle ages, and reading a sign post with all the old fashioned names, and Brain reads one as 'Pit o' barbecue? Hmm, perhaps later.'"

"Funny, but it's never going to happen," Liz said idly. "Pinky and the Brain are registered animated trademarks owned by Warner Brothers studio, and the fee to use them in advertising has got to be off the charts, especially since they were so popular a few years ago and have a huge cult following even now. No way could a little place like this afford them."

"The name was probably picked because of that episode, though," Isabel pointed out. "The phrase 'Pit of barbecue' isn't trademarked, but a lot of people would probably recognize it, though maybe not consciously."

That was right when Isabel's phone rang. "Hello?" she said, picking up the cell. "Yeah, umm... sure, we can be there in ten minutes probably - we're just at a hamburger diner near the six thirty-five seventy-five juncture." She waited for a bit. "Alright, we will." She hung up. "That was Michael."

"Okay, and?" Ava asked.

"He wanted to know if we could rendezvous sooner. Jim and Rath are all done with their errands. So I told him yes, especially because we want to head off for Louisville about as quickly as we can, right?"

"Yeah, alright," Max said. "And what else did Michael ask? I think I can guess, but..."

Isabel made a sound that was halfway between a laugh and a sigh. "He wanted us to grab a bunch of burgers and some fries, takeout. Was that what you were expecting?" Max nodded.

Heading off for the rendezvous point, which was past the border between Dallas and Denton, its neighbouring suburb to the north, Isabel brought out a little plastic comb and began working on her hair, peering at the tiny little reflection of her face in the side mirror, which she had to lean way over to see any of herself in, because it was angled for Alex to see behind him using it. "Dammit," she growled a minute later, holding up the remains of the comb in two pieces. "These are supposed to be unbreakable."

"Why don't you just use your powers on your hair, Isabel?" Ava asked.

"Well, I guess now I'm gonna have to," Isabel muttered, "but there are times when an actual comb works better."

Without a word, Liz reached out past the edge of Isabel's chair and handed her a green long plastic comb, with fine tines on the one end and very thick tines spaced widely apart on the other. "Oh, umm, thanks," Isabel muttered, blinking slightly. Ava grabbed the remains of the first comb and tried to mend it using her powers, but she couldn't seem to get it quite straight.

"So, what did you do to those guys in the club anyway, Isabel?" Max asked. "After they told you the story. You said you might give them better luck with other women, and it kinduv seemed to be working."

"I... I honestly don't know," Isabel admitted. "Maybe it was all psychological - giving them more confidence. Maybe I was able to give them a dose of personal energy, in a way that girls could pick up." She shrugged. "Doesn't really matter, does it?"

"I guess not," Max admitted with a sigh.

It was nearly another ten minutes after they got to the rendezvous parking lot that the motor-home arrived. "Okay, Liz, Ava, and I are here," Max said, coming in the side door. "Jim, Amy - want to take a turn in the van?" They shrugged and nodded. "We've got an interesting prospect - might be stopping in Louisville for a bit of detective work."

"Yeah," Ava agreed. "But that isn't for a long while yet. We've got plenty of time to talk."


	5. Chapter 5: Driving by night

"No need to worry about the traffic." Max smiled. "We'll be there half an hour early."

Liz laughed. "So we have thirty minutes to kill... I can think of a few ways. It would have been tougher to sneak away halfway through sixth period."

"Yeah."

There was a pause, and then Max started to say "Well, we can-" just as Liz blurted out "I didn't..." and it was one of those awkward pauses where each of them waited too long for the other to start again.

"Um, you first," Max mumbled.

"No, I didn't mean to interrupt."

"I insist," Max said, and Liz smiled and tried to re-board her train of thought.

"I didn't come just because you asked." Liz rolled her eyes in self-directed frustration. "That doesn't make any sense. I mean... I know that I've been acting distant, lately, but it wasn't just because you suggested this concert that I wanted to... to do something with you, right now. It was a nice idea, and the offer helped me keep some stuff straight and settle overdue business, but I'd have been with you tonight even if you didn't have concert ticket... if you wanted to be with me, that is." She sighed. "That didn't come out the way I planned, but I'm glad I said it."

"I think I know what you mean," Max said, "and I'm glad to hear it." He paused. "I'm trying to decide how much I should read into it, actually."

"It should be a question of **how** to read it instead of just how much, I think," Liz said. "What I'm doing here... it isn't tentative. I want to start slowly, but never the sort of slow that could lead to standing still. We've got too far to go for that."

Max grinned. "Well, if it wouldn't be moving too fast, I would say we should seal this with a kiss. What do you say?"

Liz nodded, beaming. "**Definitely**. Umm - pull over." And so Max manoeuvred the jeep over to the shoulder of the road, parked, and turned to Liz. For a second it was awkward, as they took their seatbelts off and he slipped his arms around hers, but then their lips met, and it was a perfect moment... tender and sweet, innocent yet hinting at the depth of the love that they felt for each other. Right now, the hint was enough.

"Umm... was there something you were trying to say, when we both spoke at the same time?" Liz asked once the kiss was finished.

"Umm... just that we can hang around and talk until the show starts," Max stuttered. "Nothing very important, as I said."

Liz was tempted to joke about how 'they could find something better to pass the time than that,' but kept quiet instead, as Max buckled in and started the engine back up. Spending that much time making out didn't seem like the best way to 'start slow,' and they did need to talk more. A rift had been created between them since last spring, one that had not closed entirely. Most of their conversation on the drive over had not gotten past the 'small talk' level, and maybe now they could get to something a little more relevant. Figure out where each of the two of them had gotten to, while the other hadn't been looking.

Liz spotted a sign on the side of the road as they sped past. "Welcome to Santa Fe. Gusty winds may exist." For some reason, a rough drawing of the front half of a scampering cat had been graffitied in beneath.

#

Michael put down his bowl of cereal and got up to see who was knocking, not turning off the miniature TV screen. As soon as the door was half open, Alex barged straight through and past him. "Come on in," Michael muttered. "What's up?"

"Nothing, nothing at all."

"Well, I was kinda watching the game, so if you've got something on your mind..." Alex, who had already paced to the far side of the living room and half the way back, reached out to grab the remote from the kitchen counter, clicked the television off, and spun round to face Michael.

"Do you have **any** idea what you've done to Maria?" Alex said.

Michael frowned. "Yes, as it happens, I do. What I'm not clear on, you being her friend notwithstanding, is where this is actually any of your business! It's a lousy situation, but it's between Maria and me..."

"Look, I don't care that you've got thirty pounds on me - or that you can kill me with some twisted alien power just by looking at me," Alex flared back. "I will **not** let you treat my friend like that. I don't care that Isabel treats me like crap, but **no one** does that to Maria, alright? As one of her best friends, I think I'm entitled to the 'you break her heart, I kick your ass' clause."

"It wasn't like I planned for things to go down this way..." Michael started. Unfortunately, just at that moment there was another tap at the door.

Alex and Michael both looked over to see a blonde girl wearing a dark blue top that was buttoned up only over her cleavage. "Knock knock," she called out in a flirty voice. Courtney.

Michael was so stunned by the immensely bad timing that he didn't see it coming. Alex must have wound up pretty hard, but all Michael remembered was the stinging impact, landing immediately around his left eye, and strong enough to send him flying back on his ass. "_Oww_!" He winced at the pain in his face, propped himself up on his hands, and looked up to see Courtney with an amused expression on her face, and Alex shaking out his right hand in an attempt to ward off the pain that the blow had cost him. It made Michael feel better on some level to see that throwing that punch had caused Alex some hurt too.

Michael prodded gently at his cheek with one finger, gritted his teeth at the discomfort that generated, and shook his head Alex. "You realize that you just risked your life?" he asked in a low whisper.

"Yeah," Alex grunted, now cradling his right hand gently in the other one.

"You're a really good friend, man," Michael said in admiration. He had intended it as an apology, but it was immediately obvious that he'd picked the wrong words.

"Call me that again," Alex growled, "and I will _really_ kick your ass!" He pointed with his sore hand at Michael for emphasis, and then hurried out, passing Courtney without a word and closing the door behind him.

Courtney crossed the living room and squatted next to where Michael was sitting on the floor. "Are you okay?" she asked, peering critically at the part of his face around the injured eye.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Michael grumbled, and she extended a helpful arm above his lap. Michael took hold of it and manoeuvred himself to a kneeling position... and then he completely forgot about getting up. He was looking directly at Courtney's face, just inches away from him... caught by the teasing look in her pale blue eyes, noticing how her straight pale hair framed smooth and rosy cheeks - trying to shake off the tempting fullness of her lips.

The things that Maria had said to him after he broke up with her were running through Michael's mind... was he really obsessed with Courtney because he thought she was another alien? Suddenly the urge to feel those lips again was irresistible. She leaned in at the same moment as he did, and their mouths met. As she kissed him back, Courtney stood up, slowly to let Michael follow her motion, and wrapped her arms around his neck. They spun around together, like two lonely planets caught in each other's orbit.

Michael stiffened and drew back a little, watching Courtney's face intently. There was a secret smile of triumph peeking out in those supple lips. Did he **really** want to be making out with the other woman so soon after splitting up with Maria?

Courtney made a small, nonverbal complaining sound, and Michael stroked the top of her wrist under her long-sleeved blue top, a soothing gesture meant to buy him time until he could decide just what he wanted. But he wasn't the surface he stroked to come off under his fingers.

Michael pulled his hand back, and the stuff came away with it... a pale, yellowish-white film, thinner than tissue paper and curling up around the edges. He had seen one of these before... it hadn't been as fresh and had disintegrated with his touch, but there was no mistaking the similarity.

"You're a skin?" he asked, not sure whether to be furious or excited.

Courtney reacted quickly... pushing him away, still with that teasing smile, and dashing down the length of the living room. Michael could hardly believe how quickly she could go from zero to breakneck speed, but he had enough presence of mind to stretch out one hand and try to pull her off course. Too late he saw the cloud of rose-purple light that trailed Courtney's departure, and felt his burst of energy skew to the side, punching a large crater in the plaster wall.

Michael could only stare in surprise as she launched herself at the window, shattering the glass and breaking the wooden struts as she crashed through. Michael dashed towards the window, but he could hear her footsteps fading away, and knew that there was no hope of catching her this time.

Maybe the skins were different in their physical capacities, Michael thought as he stood there. What Courtney had done would have made her a national-level sprinter, maybe Olympic class, and he suddenly doubted that was unusual for her kind. Were they stronger than humans - or hybrids - as well? What about their 'alien powers?' None of the four of them could create a defensive field like Courtney had just done... well, none of them had so far. They hadn't ever thought to try.

With nothing else to do right away, Michael picked up the remote and turned the television on again. Then he turned it off and grabbed the phone, dialling the number for the Valentis. Max was off at the concert, and Isabel would be coming back with him, late tonight. But Tess should hear the news as soon as possible.

#

Liz stood up in the passenger seat, holding on carefully to the door and the windshield, and let out a wild and carefree 'Whooo!' She looked around, down at Max, who smiled slightly and shook his head a little, and Liz felt compelled to add to her wild exclamation to make up for Max's composure. "**Yeah**, all right!" That seemed to do the job, and she resumed her seat, grinning like a maniac at the young man she thought of as her soul mate. "I'm a little worried about you, Max, acting so quiet and reserved at a show like that. You should be **exuberant** - I'm exuberant, aren't I?"

"That you are, and more," Max said. "Come to think of it, you're acting a little bit like you're drunk, Liz. You didn't... at the show -" He couldn't even bring himself to say it.

A line popped into Liz's head, and she would probably never get another chance to say it. "That's not alcohol, baby... That's **love**!"

It got a laugh out of Max, at least... a long and wholehearted laugh that made Liz smile just to hear it. "Well, he laughs - that's a good sign at least. Can I get a 'Whoo'?" No response other than a bit of a sidelong look from Max. "Can I **get** a '_Whooo_'?"

"Whooo," Max said, putting no emphasis into it.

"I can't hear you!" Liz shot back, really getting into the silliness now. "Okay, well, I could, because I was sitting right next to you, but still... that was pathetic. **Can I get** a '_Whhoooo_'?"

Max shook his head, laughing under his breath, and let out a wild whoop that seemed almost musical. Liz giggled and nodded approvingly. "Okay, didn't that feel good?"

"Not bad," Max admitted. "_Whooo-hooh_!" He chuckled. "Thanks. It takes a bit for me to unwind, as you might have noticed."

"Just kind of occasionally... or, like, always," Liz quipped. "So, how far is it to this place, anyway?"

"Umm..." Max peered at the odometer. "It should be only a few miles more... oh, right, there's the turnoff." Sure enough, there was a sign marking the place where they could turn off from the state highway to a smaller, rougher, and more dimly lit local road. "Umm... I realize that you might not want to talk about this right now, but there's the question of what we do, exactly... about Tess, given everything-"

"Um..." Liz paused to try to put her thoughts in order. "I don't think it's a good idea to rub her nose in the fact that we've gotten back together right away," she said slowly. "I realize that in a perfect world, we shouldn't have to worry so much about her feelings that we tiptoe around the subject, but New Mexico isn't in a perfect world. She's still invested in her idea of you being her destiny, and I don't think I want to upset her. She's a part of your family, and as callous as this sounds, you'll probably need her help in one of the next crises to hit."

Max thought for a moment. "That's... probably better than what I was about to say," he admitted. "I don't like having to hide my true feelings or watch what I say to avoid pissing her off, but you're probably right about the delicacy of the situation. Maybe we could try doing something subtle to feel her out about her reaction?"

"I'm not sure it's the best time for that just now, but we can watch for an opening."

"Why wouldn't this be the best time?" Max asked. "Is there something that you expect to change over the next few weeks? Or maybe... something that's already changing?"

"I probably shouldn't say anything about it yet," Liz whispered.

"In other words, 'yes,'" Max said. "Well, I can live with the secret for a bit. Okay, time for a new subject I guess, something completely low angst, umm..." He paused in thought for a long moment, and then asked her about a news story he'd seen about analyzing Beethoven's hair to figure out if the great composer had died of lead poisoning, which Liz hadn't heard about. She asked him questions until they arrived at Rencona. Liz handed Max a small slip of paper from the glove compartment, which he was able to use to find the doctor's office where he was supposed to pick Isabel up.

"She's probably waiting inside," Max said, undoing his belt and getting out of the Jeep. "I'll go get her."

"Wait a second," Liz said, leaving the vehicle herself. "I, umm..." He turned to see what the problem was, and Liz ran over to him, wrapping her arms around his chest and kissing him quickly, pressing her tongue between Max's lips.

"Wow," Max stammered once she was through with him.

"I just wanted to do that before..."

"Before we weren't alone together any longer?" Max finished, and she blush-smiled. "A truly excellent idea, I have to say. Umm - I'm going to have to get some sleep once we finally get back to Roswell, but... do you want to do something else this weekend? Late tomorrow afternoon maybe?"

Liz thought. "Yeah... in fact, this may not be what you had in mind, but do you want to go out to Hondo to see a fortune teller?"

Max's face showed his surprise. "No, actually, I'd planned to stick in town. What made you think of that?"

" I can't really explain the whole thing, but there's this place, Madam Vivian's, that Maria showed me, and - well, I was going to go anyway. If you'd like to come, I'll appreciate the company, but if not..."

"I will be there," he promised, kissing her one more time, more chastely, and then hurried off to the office door.

#

"Max, you can barely keep your eyes open," Isabel said. "Pull over and you can come back here and try to get some sleep. I'll take a turn driving, and Liz and I can get some girl talk in."

"I'm not ti..." Max didn't even get the word 'tired' out because of a really loud and clear yawn. "Okay, guess I can't say that I'm not kind of sleepy." He turned to Liz. "You don't mind?"

"Nah, are you kidding?" She giggled. "We've been on this date for twelve hours now! If you want to go and take a rest, by all means go ahead, I'm not offended or anything." Max smiled.

"Well, there's a Lottaburger two miles down the road," Max suggested. "We can pull in there, switch seats and you can grab some food or a coffee if you want." He yawned again. "Nothing for me I guess, if I'm going to try to get any sleep."

So Max and Isabel switched places and she continued back down the highway to Roswell. Max was curled up in one of the back seats, his eyes closed though it was hard for Liz to tell if he was asleep already or only trying (or maybe faking it,) and the girls had gotten coffees and an order of onion rings to share, and there was a small cheeseburger still wrapped up that Liz might tackle later on.

"So, what's been going on at home while I've been gone?" Isabel asked. "I called Max a few times, but he never seemed that talkative, and I felt too weird to call anyone else collect."

Liz laughed. "Well, it's been a weird week for me, for reasons that I don't want to get into at the moment." She sighed. "And Michael and Maria have been having problems too. He was trying to investigate that waitress girl Courtney, and Maria didn't like or trust some of his 'tactics.'" Liz shook her head sadly. "I hope they work it out."

Isabel shook her head. "The poor boy can't seem to manage any kind of a relationship without constant cue cards."

Liz stifled a snicker. "And... Alex has been out of sorts too. Missing you, I think."

She caught a hint of blush on Isabel's face as they went past a highway lamp. "Well... I've been thinking about him too, and about the way I left things. But the situation with Alex and me is complicated, and I think I'd thank you not to butt into our business."

"I wasn't trying to," Liz said. "That comment just kind of slipped out, and I wasn't going to take it any further." She hoped that Alex and Isabel would find their way back together too, though.

"So," she said, trying to change the subject. "Are you going to have a whole bunch of catch-up work when you get back to school, or did your teachers give you a heads up on the material to study while you were on candy striper duty?"

Isabel snorted. "Candy striper? Well anyway, I got a study guide for one or two of my classes, and I was kind of ahead on schoolwork anyway. It shouldn't take too long to sort things out." She sighed.

#

"This is it?" Max asked as Liz pulled into the parking lot next to the small building. Despite the neon signs in front, turned off in the daytime, it looked like nothing but a run-down three bedroom house.

"Yeah," Liz agreed. "Why, were you expecting something... flashier?"

"Not really." Max paused a moment. "I guess I'm just having a bit of trouble seeing you as someone who'd actually _want_ to go and consult a psychic."

She shrugged. "Live with it." A sunny and playful grin followed those words. "You don't really mind coming, do you?"

"Nah, not since you drove," Max quipped. "I mean, I don't really understand it, but... just spending time with you is amazing, no matter how silly I think the activity is."

"Um, cool I guess." Liz got out too and slipped Max a quick kiss. "Okay... how about we pretend like we're strangers, and see if Madam Vivian can tell that we're really a couple if we come in separately?" That sounded like fun... it was also a way to make sure that Max wouldn't come in with her, because she wasn't sure she wanted him to hear.

"All right. You want to go in first?"

"Okay." There wasn't anyone in the waiting room, and the last customer came out before Max walked in. Madam Viv put the cards away and folded her arms as soon as she saw Liz.

"I have a policy of no repeat readings within three weeks for new customers."

Liz blinked in surprise. "Come on, this is important! I drove half an hour on four hours' sleep last night - you _have_ to give me another go! "

Vivian seemed dubious. "Why? I mean, it's not like I gave you a bad reading the other day. Why can't you just be satisfied with it?"

"Umm..." Liz shook her head, sitting down, even though Vivian hadn't asked her to and seemed not to appreciate it. "This may sound confusing, but I know what that last reading was about, and things have changed. I mean, it's possible to change someone's future, isn't it?"

Vivian thought about that. "Yes, but it's not easy or common. How can you be sure that your fate has changed... maybe you didn't even understand the ultimate course of destiny yourself."

"I guess I can't be sure, but call it a strong hunch," Liz said. "Come on, I'll pay you triple the usual fee, with no refunds. Just give it your best shot; I'd **really** like to know what your cards say."

"Okay, if you're sure. But, even if nothing fundamental has changed, the reading won't be the same as it was before - it never is. The cards will tell you about some different aspect of your situation or problem. Most people don't understand that, which is why I have the policy."

"I think I know what you mean," Liz said. "All right?" She peeled out the bills and set them down, then reached out to touch the deck of tarot cards when Vivian offered them. Liz couldn't seem to stop staring at the cards as Vivian shuffled them, and then started to deal out in a pattern that she remembered from before. "Okay, there's your significator, the Princess of swords, in the second pile, which means that this is an air reading, a thinking problem. Last time it came up water, for an emotional reading." She set the deck down for a moment and snatched Liz's money, stuffing it into a pocket of her long black dress.

"Okay, go on," Liz muttered. A transition from the domain of emotions to the realm of logical thought made sense... she had dealt with Future Max, not just by trusting her heart, but by trusting her head and figuring out the logic of the situation. But she had to wait for more to figure out if this divination stuff was actually relevant or a bunch of nonsense.

"Covering the princess, representing the root of the issue you wanted to consult the ethers about..." she dealt out the next card and placed it squarely on top of Liz's significator, having cleared the others away first. It looked to Liz like a compass surrounded by clouds and fantasy beasts. "The wheel of fortune, representing destiny." Liz gasped in shock. "The way that the threads of lives weave about you, a turning point altering the course of events. Given your sense of change, and the way you were concerned about the last reading suddenly not applying any more, I can't say I'm surprised that this is your primary factor, your present environment. The cards understand what you want to ask."

"Okay," Liz said, a little doubtfully. Despite the term that Vivian had used, this didn't seem to represent what she'd feared at first... maybe it was even relevant in the way she said. On the other hand, as a working psychic she had to be very good at gauging what her client wanted to hear and slanting her interpretations to reflect that, (if not to accommodate it necessarily.)

"Next... crossing the wheel is the nine of swords, representing guilt or anguish. You are worried... about something that you've done perhaps? Some way that you tried to change the course of the wheel, to impose your own vision on the future?" Liz carefully kept her face as neutral as possible.

"In your foundation... the king of cups. Now that's interesting! I recognize him from your last reading, where he was in your future, the leader who chose love with you - the man you were going to marry. Here he is instead your root cause, the deep unconscious influence that permeates everything you brood about. I imagine you have quite a complicated history with him."

"That card showing up there, instead of my future or somewhere else in the reading - is that bad?" Liz had to ask.

"It's hard to say until the spread is complete. That he lands here indicates that he is part of your soul, but he may or not be part of your future. Should I continue on?" Liz nodded, and the next card was dealt to the left of the initial formation. "In your past... is the hermit. Another major Arcanum, which will certainly have a strong influence. Normally, he represents introspection and guidance, but landing here, and inverted..." She looked up at Liz, startled. "There's an alternate interpretation of the origin of this card that it is Chronos bearing the hourglass of time. Maybe someone **did** change history. Someone or something that could... step outside history as we know it, who relates to time in a different way than we do."

Liz was starting to get spooked. "You... are you serious?"

"I think so - why? It's not how I'd normally interpret that card, just something that kind of popped into my head."

"Keep going," Liz insisted.

"Crowning you, representing your attitudes, your goal... well, no big surprise here, it's the nine of cups. Represents achieving a goal or obtaining your heart's desire, which is almost redundant in the topmost position of the cross. More specifically, it can represent getting results that you have hoped for... or making love." Liz blushed. "In your future position, the three of coins... teamwork, functioning well as a unit, getting a job done competently through co-operation."

"That's nice to know," Liz muttered. Now, as last time, Vivian moved to the side of the 'cross' of cards that had been laid out on the table.

"The card representing you at the base of the 'staff' is the tower, which fits with what you said, and the wheel of fortune indicated, about being in turmoil since you saw me last. You have gone through a sudden change and all of your plans have been disrupted, possibly made at least one very emotional outburst lately. Things have happened which you might have seen as a negative turn of your fortune, but this is more than overbalanced by the value of a blinding revelation... suddenly realizing a great truth and seeing an answer."

Another card, above the last. "The point of view of others, though, is the four of swords - rest and quiet preparation. Those around you have no idea of the dangerous forces you have been struggling with... if you'll take my advice - find someone who you can confide in. Keeping events as momentous as these inside and secret isn't healthy. But that's not specifically relevant to your question."

"The key factor in your staff is..." Vivian started with a spiel for the next card, but Liz interrupted her.

"That's the lovers again!" It was almost a squeal of delight, but Vivian's face fell.

"Actually, the card is inverted here, and so I don't think it means love in quite the same was as before. This time, I would tend to interpret it as... choice, which many people seem to think is a dirty word. Choice is usually thought of in terms of difficult dilemmas that have no good alternative, but..."

"All of living is making choices," Liz breathed.

"That's a very good way to put it."

"So... this card here... does it suggest that I'll be able to make my choices well? That they'll help with the co-operation and competence, and lead me to my satisfaction?" Liz reeled off, pointing to other cards in the layout in quick succession. "Help me to change the course of the wheel of life?"

"I would tend to say so, though it's not as clear as it could be," Vivian hedged. "And the final card, your overall outcome, is... there, the Star of Hope. That would help to confirm it as well. "If you think positively and have faith in your blessings, you can look forward to great success." She paused, contemplating the reading as a whole. "Yes, this confirms what you said about many things changing just over the past few days, but the outlook is positive. The anguish and guilt you feel is not justified, if it was intended to keep the hermit Time from interfering with your crown. Do you have any questions? I might be able to sub-define a card or two meaningfully, if it will help."

Liz thought about that. "What about the king?"

Vivian laughed. "Okay. Covering him is... the ten of cups. Radiant love, delight in good fortune... working for peace in his family. Crossing him as a complicating influence is... the judge in session. He is taking on difficult responsibilities, trying to do what's right."

"Yeah, that sounds like him," Liz muttered before she could stop herself. "Umm... could I get a little more info on these choices that I'm going to be making?" she asked, tapping the upside-down lovers card.

"I think it might be better not." Vivian started to gather up the cards. "On the other hand... do you want some of your money back? I feel a little bad keeping it all, since you were really right - you needed to know."

"Umm..." Liz thought about that. "Well, if you feel that way, you could give me half of it back. That works out well for me, and it comes out to a fifty percent tip on your usual fee, which I think you deserve."

"Okay." Vivian sorted through the bills and passed some of them back. "If there's someone in the waiting room, could you tell them to come on in?"

Liz waited for Max out in the Jeep until he left the building, which didn't seem to take too long. "Well?"

"A few cards into the reading she asked me if I knew the girl who had been in before, and when I admitted that, she said I was your 'prince charming,'" Max said, smiling.

"Okay. What about the rest of the reading?"

"Oh, the usual canned tripe. Great challenges, passionate love, the importance of friends, knowledge is power... I have to tell you, Liz, I really don't believe in this stuff. Nobody can shuffle a deck of cards and tell you what your life is going to be like." He leaned in over the door frame and kissed her on the arm. "I keep telling you, Liz - we make our own destinies."

She smiled. "I guess you're right. So, should I drive on the way back too?"

"Why don't you start," Max said, going over to the passenger door, "and maybe I'll take over at Highway Mill, across the country line?"

She kissed him one more time, and started the motor.


	6. Chapter 6: Wilson Brothers Limited

Rath's eyes swept over Ava as she climbed up the ladder to the sleeping alcove. She was definitely quite a package - petite but shapely and with a kind of taut, unassuming athleticism that just got all of his engines roaring. He tried not to compare Ava to Lonnie any more. That could cause a lot of mischief if he ever let something of the sort slip out loud, and in any event he didn't really see much point. He and Lonnie were over, and even though he thought that they'd be running together for a long time, he was satisfied as being better off with Ava, and not just because of her brain and her personality. Lonnie had been stacked as all get-out, her impressive body smooth and delightful to touch, but she hadn't had the kind of tone that Ava did.

Anxiously, Rath climbed up the ladder himself in turn, wishing that there was a curtain that could be pulled across the opening or something like that. Of course, nobody much was around but young Valenti, snoozing on the couch - he wouldn't be able to see anything from that part of the motor home's living space, and probably wouldn't hear much even if they got loud. Still, Rath was bothered by the way the boundary from the alcove into the kitchen area was just a plane through empty space. He looked over at Ava, trying to gauge her mood. The impish smile splattered across her cute face was a good sign. "What's the joke?"

"Oh, just thought it was funny, that... well, I'm actually not sure how right I am, but looking at you right then I thought I could tell what you were thinking - and that was without trying to use my powers or anything."

"Really?" Rath lifted one eyebrow in a really bad Mister Spock impression. "Fascinating. What did you think I thought?"

"Umm... that you were wondering just how much noise we could make up here without Kyle noticing?"

"Hmm..." Rath considered. "I give you partial marks. It certainly bears on what I was thinking, but that wasn't all of it or really the important part." Sigh. "Not that I want you to bug me until I say what really was going through my head."

Ava rolled her eyes. "Okay, fine. Maybe I'm just going to have to get you thinking about something I can predict a little better, then." Ava pulled up her sweatshirt, yanking the fabric away from her arms and up over her head, disarraying her short blonde hair briefly as it went. Underneath, she was wearing a black spaghetti tank camisole, that didn't entirely match the image presented by her olive green, baggy surplus pants and clunky black shoes, but since each of the individual pieces worked on their own, the combination was oddly hot. "How about now?"

"That you're... Umm, I thought you were going to predict, not bug," Rath realized at the last moment possible before spilling.

"Okay, all right." Ava sighed and looked to the heavens for a moment like she was praying for strength. (On the other hand, she couldn't really see the heavens from that point, so it sort of looked as if she was praying to the dim light bulb for strength.) "That I'm... really hot?"

"Actually, I was going to say 'oddly' hot, but you're improving," Rath teased.

"And now?" Ava gestured, sending her pants into component atoms and back again in such a position that she wasn't wearing them anymore. Now the black camisole top, clunky black boots were joined by guys' boxer shorts in a white and black checkerboard print. _Rath's_ boxer shorts. He hadn't realized that Ava ever stole his underpants, but it kind of helped to explain why they occasionally disappeared and reappeared right where he'd looked for them the other day. "Improving even more."

"Hmmm?" Ava seemed to take a moment before putting things together - that by taking off the pants, she had gotten slightly less weird and even hotter in Rath's perceptions, thus making her earlier guess that he found her 'really hot' closer to the truth. Certainly the sight of her shapely legs, bare from the edge of the shorts - Rath's own shorts - to the top of the boots, more than two thirds of the way up her calves, was exciting him tremendously. "Well... I have to say that you're wearing too many clothes your own self. Get the point?"

Rath stretched back slightly. "Maybe you could help me with that little problem?"

"Hey, come on - I already took off my own clothes, and now you want me to take yours off too? I'm not gonna do all the work for you, bud." Ava's tone of voice was light and playful - Rath had quickly learned to pay attention to the signs of when she was pissed off, even before they left New York for the first time. Lonnie had dismissed Ava as a scared little mouse for years, and even Zan had often seemed to think that she lacked backbone and nerve. But Rath felt the legacy of a warrior, and from that vantage point he had been able to tell that even though Ava had been the least confident of the four of them in some ways, she was a fighter, too - and a scrappy, fierce one at that. He didn't want to make her mad, and he knew that Zan and Lonnie had been on the other end of her unique sort of payback without ever even realizing that they should have feared her.

"But I was driving for hours and hours," Rath said, taking the game another step. "Have a little mercy on a man. Plus - I won't make you do all the work all the way through. Count on that, that I'll do more than my fair share a little later on."

"Hmm... but will you just be doing what you want to do?" Ava asked probingly, leaning close and starting to tug invisibly at the bonds between the molecules of Rath's own heavy sweater. Rath couldn't resist staring down the neckline of her camisole into a small expanse of perfectly shaped cleavage, when she leaned up to him like that.

"I... I'm not going to roll over like a little puppy dog and do just what you want me to do," Rath countered as assertively as he could manage in that situation. "But I'll do stuff that you've been known to enjoy quite a lot in the past, and I'll do my best to make sure that you get an extra kick out of it this time."

"Hmm... sounds like a deal." Apparently changing her mind about using her powers on Rath's sweater, she took the fabric at the back of his neck and the top of his bicep in her small hands, and tugged hard enough that there was a distinctive tearing sound.

"Hey, come on, you don't need to be that rough with me!"

"Aww, boohoo. I didn't hurt you did I, just the sweater. And you can fix that yourself once we're done. Come on." Next Rath was turned around, briefly on his hands and knees, just long enough for Ava to carefully undo his jeans and pull them - and the pair of boxers that Rath himself were wearing, a blue snakes on white design - down to lower thighs, and then push him on his back so that the shoes and everything else from his lower body could get removed. Rath hadn't been wearing anything underneath the sweater put a bit of jewellery, which Ava seemed to think could stay.

"Okay, time for me to take a turn," Rath declared confidently, and Ava pressed close, kissing him heatedly before backing away enough that Rath could focus his attention on her camisole, letting his fingers stroke and minister to the swollen flesh underneath, first through the fabric, and then his hands moving underneath her garment. Finally, as Ava was starting to moan and whimper, despite clearly not wanting to make too much noise, Rath knew that it was time to move on. He pulled the camisole off, ripping it slightly, just as Ava had done to his sweater, though he hadn't intended that as a form of payback; her beautiful breasts bobbed and bounced slightly as they were freed of the last faint vestiges of confinement. Then, eagerly, Rath used his powers to take the boxer shorts off his girlfriend without interfering with the boots, (man, boots were hot,) and brought his left hand to her hot and slightly sticky loins, while Ava plastered her naked chest against his own and started to kiss the side of his neck more scorchingly than he'd realized was possible.

Soon, they'd moved past that and Rath was busily engaged in, well, to not put it too delicately, screwing her into the mattress like his cock had a Phillips head. His hands were carefully supporting much of the weight of his upper body, brushing against her upper arms and shoulders, and their torsos met with every thrust, the hard tips of Ava's nipples seeming to scratch the skin of the middle of Rath's chest as they moved against each other. Between the incredible beauty and sexuality of the girl beneath her, the intensity and building pleasure of the love that they were making, the calmly serene and oddly innocent look on Ava's face, and the general stress and uncertainty of their frenzied escape plan, some or all of these factors hit Rath with mass of emotional force that took him entirely by surprise. Wheezing in shock, and screwing his eyes up into a tight squint to keep any tears from having an easy time of escaping, he said to her in an urgent undertone - "Don't ever leave me."

Ava stiffened slightly... which had an odd and not unpleasant effect on the physical proceedings, but it wasn't hard to tell that she had been able to tell the change that had come over Rath and was surprised by it, especially since Rath was about the last guy she'd ever have expected to get clingy on her, especially in the midst of having sex. "Why... umm, you never know..." She sighed, obviously finding it hard to concentrate on what either of them was saying in the middle of things. "Why - why would I ever leave you?"

Which was far from a ringing assurance, but Rath didn't press for further conversation until they were both finished... in fact, not until Ava was finished twice - for a bunch of reasons, partly to make up for the strangeness of that moment, and partly just to show her how deeply he felt for her, he had indeed gone in face first and done some of Ava's favourite things to her without any question or intention of repayment to her. After all that was done, with her perfect body snuggled up against him, both still naked but covered by two sheets and a blanket, Ava started the discussion. "So, umm... is this about Kyle?"

Rath shifted slightly, uncomfortable. "Not... especially. I mean... I know that you still like him, and I'm not especially worried about that." He looked at Ava, and she shrugged a little. "But... I don't know, somehow it just hit me... oh, crap; I never thought I'd actually have to say this, but somehow I don't have a choice. I love you, girl."

Ava reached out to stroke his arm. "I... I love you too, Rath, I love you a lot. I wouldn't have... have started this if I didn't. But... but I loved Zan too, though not quite in the same way." She sighed. "And... and I'm not sure if I can really say that what we've got is the kind of love that lasts and lasts, on and on. I - I don't want to leave you, Rath. I don't expect it to happen or anything like that. But... but I'm not sure I can tell you 'forever' yet."

"It's okay," Rath said quickly. "I... I shouldn't have asked for it. Just - umm, just kinduv got on too much of a roll with the moment I guess."

"Alright." But something in Ava's face said that she was worried that this wouldn't be the end of it. "Did... did you leave that message for Lonnie?"

"Yeah. No response yet, but then, I'm not sure when to expect one."

"Okay." Ava reached out to him again, holding Rath's hand in her own, and stiffened slightly. "_Eeiii_!"

"Ava!" Rath exclaimed, suddenly grabbing Ava and looking into her eyes. "What... what is it?"

"He's... he's here." Ava sucked in a ragged breath. "Kivar. I... I saw him - he's in a Skin, a pretty damned good one, and he was walking through the doors of the Crashdown. Nothing... nothing really happened aside from that, but there was such a..." Ava shivered. "His mind was so menacing - so dangerous."

Rath sighed. "Was... was there anyone else with him, that you could see?"

"Yeah, umm... three other people that looked like humans, two guys and one a girl, not quite as tall as Isabel, with reddish-blonde hair. And - and a few figures in really creepy suits - that didn't show any faces, or any skin for that matter. Some sort of environmental clean suits I think."

"Doesn't sound like much," Rath muttered. "But... but he's probably got more backup than you could see." Ava nodded, her entire body trembling. "The people who looked like people - did you get any sense that they were skins too? Or shifters, or... anything?"

"No, not really," Ava said. "Most of my attention was drawn to Kivar - otherwise I probably couldn't have told that he was wearing a Skin. Well, that, and we already pretty much knew that K wouldn't be likely to have shape-shifting tricks." She looked up at Rath. "I... I don't want to be alone right now."

"Al- alright," Rath muttered. "But - but one of us should remember to tell Max and the others about this, as soon as we can."

"Totally." Ava lay back, and Rath started running his fingers through her hair, trying to relax her.

Max woke up with a big shudder. "I didn't need to see that much detail about Rath and Ava doing that," he complained out loud to no-one in particular but himself. Rath had actually told him that Ava had detected Kivar's landing on Earth - he'd come down to the cab an hour and a half before dawn, but he hadn't given as many details as Max had heard in the dream, possibly because he hadn't wanted to leave Ava alone for long. Max groaned slightly, rolled over, and tried to get to sleep again without needing to worry about spooky dreams.

#

When he finally felt ready to venture out and face the world again, they were apparently only fifty minutes away from the edge of Louisville. There must have been another stretch and switch that Max hadn't noticed, because Michael, Maria, and Liz were all sitting around the kitchen table and playing cards, while Ava and Rath were sitting on the couch. "Hey, where's everybody else?" he asked.

"Umm... well, Maria's mom and Kyle's dad, and Kyle are in the van," Rath explained. "Isabel and Alex are up in the cab. How're you feeling? Had any good dream?"

"Well... I'll tell you later," Max said, not wanting to get into things in such a big public setting. Instead he went over to sit next to Liz and give her a kiss. "So what are you guys playing?"

"It's called Skat," Maria said. "Some German game that Liz picked up out of a book. It's really confusing."

"Well, once you get a hang of the idea that the jack of hearts is not really a heart unless hearts are trumps, then it's easy," Liz said.

"Even when there aren't any trumps," Michael put in.

"Well, there are really always a few trumps, unless you're playing a complete loser," Liz quickly jumped in to clarify.

"Okay, I'm intrigued, but also confused," Max said. "Start explaining at the beginning?"

"Something else we need to cover first, Maxwell," Michael told him. "Laurie called... she's probably already landed in Louisville."

"Cool," Max decided. "So, do we pick her up before trying to catch a clue at this, umm, this contractor's office place, I guess?"

"That makes sense," Maria said. "More sense than these cards do, at least. Hopefully, there won't be much danger at the office, and it doesn't make sense to leave her waiting for longer. Who knows, she might be useful - spot something, or be able to sweet-talk someone who works there."

"All right," Liz said. "Okay, well, the dealer gives ten cards to each player and two down into the kitty in the middle of the table..."

#

"Hey, everybody!" Laurie said, pulling her suitcase-on-wheels out of the airport behind her, with another suitcase balance on the same frame. "How's it going?"

"Pretty well," Max said, smiling, as Michael and then Maria hugged Laurie. Max hadn't really gotten a good chance to meet Michael's sister - actually the granddaughter of his human 'DNA donor' - but he definitely approved of the change that had started to come over Michael ever since they met, and he felt an odd kind of affection for the girl despite all that they didn't know about each other. Laurie turned around, trying to get her bearings on the situation - and spotted Rath.

"Oh, gosh," she muttered. "Um, you said - you said that you kinduv had an identical twin, but I didn't expect that..." she stepped up as if to bring her hand up to Rath's face, and then suddenly stopped when he frowned slightly. "Sorry, didn't mean to upset you, I was just so surprised."

"M-my fault," Michael muttered. "I - I should have told you that Rath would be along."

"No, I should have guessed," Laurie said. "And, umm... Isabel, hi, Mister Valenti, Max." She looked around at all the others present. "You guys look tense. Introductions can wait for later?"

"K-kind of, yes," Maria said. "Did... did Michael tell you why we were coming here to Louisville?" Laurie shook her head a bit as Maria led her up through the side door of the motor home.

"He... he said that you were running away from this alien guy and weren't sure where you'd be going," she managed to get out. "Umm, that was last evening, before he told me to come to Louisville. But, umm, that's pretty much it."

"Alright," Maria said, reaching out to steady Laurie as the motor home pulled back out into the airport exit lanes. "Well... all that's true, but we've also found out about some kind of mystery... an alien was spotted here in Louisville yesterday, who might either be a friend who can help us get away from the bad aliens... or a bad alien out looking for us. Even though the odds are a little tricky, we kinda need to find her... find her either way."

"Alright," Laurie replied. "Umm... how can I help, or can I?"

"We - we don't really have a plan yet," Michael explained to Laurie. "So... umm, just stand by on that. Were your flights okay?"

"Yeah, well, it's not that much fun flying through the night, especially when you have to change planes and run across a Georgia airport at full tilt to make your connection at 4 am," Laurie explained, "but aside from that it wasn't too bad." She looked around. "Okay, you must be Liz, right?" she said, with a nod at the other girl. "Maria's told me a lot about you. And - and you'd be Ava, because you can't exactly be Tess at the moment."

"Yeah, that's me," Ava replied. "The not-Tess. My greatest achievement, somehow, seems to be that I avoided becoming her."

"Well, that's nothing to sneeze at," Alex threw in, and several of the others laughed.

"How've you been doing lately in Tucson, Laurie?" Liz asked.

"Settling in fairly nicely, I think. I... I hope that I get to go back." That suddenly took all the high spirits out of everybody's sails. "Sorry, didn't mean to be a downer, just..."

"No, I understand," Maria assured her. "It... it's gonna be that kind of week, or that kind of couple of days, at least."

#

"Hmm... okay, yeah, I definitely think that you and Kyle should be the ones to go in," Liz said, smiling just slightly. "It's a woman at the reception desk, and somehow I think that you're not going to be able to get any further than that without charming her. Isabel can stay here and try to get into her subconscious thoughts... or those of anyone else you meet who might be hiding something." She looked over at Isabel. "Assuming that you're up for it."

"Ohh... just the thought of it makes my head hurt," Isabel complained. Though she'd had some luck in penetrating the subconscious thoughts of people who were awake, using a variant of her natural talent at alien dream-walking, Isabel never liked the process and frequently complained when circumstances made it necessary. But - "I'll try my best."

"Do or do not, there is no try," Kyle quoted with a big smile. Isabel glared at him for a long moment before speaking.

"Listen, bud. Do you wanna end up as short, as green, and as funny looking as Yoda one day, without the cool light sabre tricks? If not, then never quote him to me again."

Kyle scoffed. "You couldn't even."

"No, but I'd have some fun trying... and I might not be able to put you back into your old shape again."

"Okay, come on, break it up," Maria said. "No need to get into a big argument over this kind of thing." She sighed. "Whatever mental support you can contribute would be much appreciated, Isabel."

"They didn't tell you anything about where this supply closet was, in the building?" Jim asked, frowning slightly.

"No," Alex said. "But the guys could ask - if they get past the front desk, that is. It would seem very funny coming in the front and asking about the supply closet first thing."

"Yeah," Michael agreed. "You know, maybe you should go in too, Mister Valenti. You've got good investigation procedure experience, and - a kind of dashing charm that might help out where the good looks of younger guys would fail us." Several people turned to give him looks. "Well, it's true. And that's why you picked Max and Kyle, right Liz? I mean... much as it pains me to admit it, they're clearly the pretty boys out of our crew."

"Yeah, alright, three of you. It kinduv works in a weird way," Amy chimed in. "And maybe you should get going, before anybody starts wondering what we're all doing huddled out here." So Max smiled at Liz and spared just enough time to reach out and stroke her arm with his hand, and then headed for the front door, Kyle and Jim falling in behind him. A tinny little bell tinkled in as he opened the door.

"Umm, hi, this is a little embarrassing," he said, stepping up to the reception desk. "I'm trying to track down someone, and was told that she was seen around this building. She's very pretty, long red hair, green eyes, around five six, and a, umm, daring fashion sense."

The woman looked up at him. "Oh, yeah, sonny," she replied. "I just bet you'd love to meet someone like that. Got a name?"

Max tried to sound as smooth as he could. "Well, umm... when I met her she introduced herself as Emily Taylor," Max said, "but, umm... well, apparently she likes to change that around quite a bit."

The receptionist's eyes narrowed, trying to take Max's measure, for a long moment. "I... I'd like to help you out, kid, really I would. But I don't remember seeing anyone like that around here... certainly not for a few months. Umm, there was Carol Shanning, who temped in telephone dispatch for a while three months ago, though I'd call her hair more strawberry than really red. She disappeared, though... in fact, we're holding some paycheques and haven't been able to reach her to get her to come in or give us a forwarding address for the cheques."

Hmm," Max thought. That sounded strange, but not really - well, he couldn't see any way that it would connect with the clue that they'd been given by the guy in the Dallas nightclub, so he just filed it away.

"We're also possibly interested in finding, erm, Emily's mother," Jim put in. He quickly recaps the description of the older lady... gray hair, didn't walk too quickly or well, and filled in a few relatively bland bits of description that wouldn't really exclude anyone too much. "Does that person sound familiar?"

"Umm... actually, it sounds a bit like Jason's mother," the receptionist replied. "Jason Madison, he's our accounting supervisor. Very young, maybe twenty-five or twenty-six. I suppose he might have a sister like you described. I don't know exactly the story why his mother's so much older or seems so frail - maybe she was just getting on when she had kids."

"I realize that this would be very unusual," Jim pressed charmingly, "but could we perhaps speak with Jason?"

"Umm... let's see." She returned Jim's gaze. "You... you don't want me to call ahead and let him know that there are strange people coming, do you? If this woman really is his sister... she did something wrong or owes you some money, right?"

"Not quite," Kyle said darkly. "But yeah, the advantage of surprise would really help."

"Okay, umm..." The receptionist considered. Max wondered if Isabel was using her talents to make her more receptive to this odd request, because when the reply finally came, it went like... "I'll go and see if he's in his office. And **please** try not to cause any more trouble than you have to." With that, she disappeared. The three guys from Roswell traded a few looks, and Kyle immediately took off, running back towards the others who were waiting outside. Max didn't understand the point - until the receptionist had come back, and asked "Now who are **you** girls?" Maria and Ava were just coming in - ah, that made a little sense, at least to Kyle's terms. Now that they knew they'd be facing a man next, he went to fetch a few cute young girls. (Isabel would probably have made the biggest impression on a 26-year old finance hotshot - she always seemed to have something about her that attracted older guys. But she was busy back behind the scenes.) And because five of them would have seemed like too many, Kyle stayed behind himself. All right.

"Umm, hi Dad," Maria adlibbed. "We finally found a place to park the car, but I think Kevin wants to keep an eye on it."

"Alright, this way," the receptionist said, and led them through a few twisting corridors to a fairly fancy office. Jim Valenti led the questioning of Mister Madison, acting a bit like he was a private investigator or something, hired to track 'Emily' down, and the girls tried using sweeter talk at what seemed like the appropriate moments. Madison didn't give up much, though. The woman who occasionally (two incidents) visited him here in the office was actually his mother-in-law, and he wasn't about to give out any contact information for her without a much better reason than any they had hinted, and a clearly stated one at that. He didn't care what this red-headed girl Emily had done.

"What color is your wife's hair?" Max blurted out, not sure if he'd catch the guy out on this one. Jason turned to face Max, drumming his fingers on the table with annoyance.

"She's a blonde."

"Have you ever met one of her sisters?" Jim pressed.

"She doesn't have any. Two brothers - I'm good friends with one of them. The other moved up to Alaska ten years ago."

Max suddenly realized that Jason was still tapping his fingers on the edge of his desk. That... that was a clue! When Tess had mind-warped people, altering their behaviour, emotion, or memories, the tapping fingers had been a sign that the warped parts of a person's mind were under pressure or that the effect was about to wear off. Everyone else saw it too, but nobody was saying anything.

"Well, umm... thanks for your time, sir," Max told him finally. "I think we can find our own way out."

"Oh, no, I insist on making sure that you have an escort to the door." Well, that was pretty clearly the bum's rush. Mister Madison found some flunky to assign the chore too, and Max avoided making eye contact with the receptionist, not wanting to get her into trouble. Soon they had gotten back to the cars, and drove out of the parking lot and around the corner just in case.

"Isabel, did you get anything from that guy?" Ava asked right away.

"Umm... I think so, but I'm not quite sure what," Isabel shook her head in frustration, and Alex sat down next to her, (she was on the couch in the back of the motor home,) and put an arm tightly around her shoulder.

"Madison had been mind-warped," Maria pointed out. "I... I'm sure of it."

"Oh?" Isabel looked up. "Hmm... I don't think I realized that, but it kind of makes the images in his head a little less confusing. Some of them are probably real and some of them faked, though I'm not completely sure which are which."

"So how do we find out more, and quickly?" Kyle asked. "We... we can't afford to wait here in Louisville long enough for Madison to get home from work I think. If that's the only alternative, then we just go on and forget about our redheaded girl."

"Well, I can probably try hacking into their computer network," Alex said with a nasty smile. He reached out to tap the closed laptop. "I just so happened to notice that they have a cutting-edge wireless network, with the parking lot in range of the signal... and no really noticeable security. What should I look for?"

"A home address for Madison," Max put in. "Hate to bring up the idea of breaking and entering, but that might actually get us some answers."

"Also," Liz said. "Look for anything about their business that might hint at why a shape-shifter, or any other alien, might be interested enough in this company to go to all the trouble."

"Okay, I'll see what I can figure out." Alex moved over to the van, since it could more easily be moved back into the Wilson brothers' parking lot without attracting much attention. The rest of them started talking and trying to agree on further plans.

#

After a few minutes, Max excused himself and slipped out the door of the motor home. He had only walked around outside for a few seconds before he could hear someone else leaving the vehicle. "You did well in there," Liz said. Max turned around and smiled at her, enjoying his girlfriend's simple beauty in today's wardrobe selection - simple black pants and a sleeveless purple shirt.

"Uh - how do you know that?" Max asked. The three of them had described what they'd accomplished and learned inside the office, but very little of what anyone in particular had done.

"Umm..." Liz seemed a little puzzled by that for a moment. "Isabel gave us a bit of a play by play before you got here." To Max, this sounded like it was maybe only a half truth, and that Liz realized that. Was she able to tell what had happened somehow with her own emergent powers? It was hard to say. "Ohh, by the way, I was meaning to ask you when we got a chance to be alone - what was in your dream this morning?"

Max sighed. "That's a little embarrassing." But he could not deny Liz the truth, and he went over to hug her and tell her at the same time. "It was all about Ava and Rath, after Alex and I took over for them driving last night. Right after I **had** the first dream, actually. And, well, parts of it were a little bit - explicit. R-rated, nothing truly graphic."

"Ohh," Liz said, her eyes bugging out a bit. "I... I thought that Ava wasn't actually having the sex with Rath, but I guess things change." She sighed. "Yeah, now I understand why you didn't want to tell everybody. Maybe should be careful what you tell the two of them, even. Would certainly be weird for me if I thought Isabel was able to find out what happened... when we were together." She paused. "It would probably be even weirder for you and Isabel, with the brother and sister thing."

"Yeah," Max agreed. "I've actually been hoping I don't have to go through a dream like that about Isabel and Alex."

"Hmm." Liz cocked her head. "Do you think Isabel and Alex get R-rated?" After a second, she realized, "Sorry, that wasn't even a question you want to hear I guess, so I take it back."

"That's okay," Max said, but he didn't bother answering the query anyway. "Ohh, there was something else. Afterwards." Max had decided not to tell Liz about Rath's sudden emotional attack in the middle, or their further discussion about that - Ava could share that stuff with her close friend or not as she pleased. "Ava got a flash, of Kivar in Roswell - going into the Crashdown cafe, with some kind of backup."

"Um, yeah, she told me about that while you were sleeping," Liz said, "though she didn't mention much about it being afterwards of anything in particular." Liz sighed. "I guess I just have to have hope and faith that my parents will be okay."

"Yeah." Max sighed. "I wonder what Kivar looks like now, in his human skin."

"Oddly enough, I asked Ava about that," Liz said, giggling. "Tall but not too tall, short dark hair. Handsome, intelligent face, with a slightly larger than average nose, kind of triangular jaw, glasses. She couldn't see what color his eyes were, because of the glasses."

"Hmmm." Max considered that mental picture. "He doesn't sound too threatening or assuming in appearance."

"Maybe not, though I suppose it depends on details that are a little hard to pick up from a quick flash. Definitely we should be _extremely_ careful about him, though." Liz shivered a bit, just as Ava had shuddered n the dream. "Ava was definitely freaked out more by him than anything else in her flash."

"Yeah, I won't forget about that," Max assured her, then looked around. "Any idea how long Alex and the others will be gone?"

"Not really," Liz said. "Probably takes a while to find all that stuff in the office network. Don't worry about it."

"Okay." Max nodded agreement. "Well, I don't really feel like going back inside the motor home. We've both spent too much time in there lately, and we'll have to spend more."

"Yeah," Liz agreed. "Well, just hanging out here with you is nice."

Max smiled.

It was nearly half an hour before Alex and the others in the van came back... with a quiet but exuberant 'mission accomplished' - at least, in terms of the home address for their mind-warped Financier. (Was that the right word, Max wondered to himself.) Alex had also 'downloaded' a large amount of information on the company's operations, but so far hadn't been able to find any connection that made sense for an alien's motives yet.

There'd been another development by that point. Maria had gone up to the cab of the motor home and started listening to the Louisville 'all-news, stay informed' radio station, and there was disturbing news that she had been informed of. State police in the central south and the FBI Interstate Criminal Violence unit were attempting to find and apprehend a paramilitary gang that had appeared with no warning in Roswell, New Mexico and were now believed to have crossed the Texas state line. There had been several million dollar's worth of property damage in several fires started in Roswell, over forty people injured, and two victims currently unaccounted for.

"Unaccounted for, what does that mean?" Maria asked, turning to Michael. "Did Kivar take hostages?"

"It... it's hard to say," Michael said in a low voice. "Might be that there are a few people who simply got, umm, misplaced during the confusion. They could even be unhurt." He took a deep breath. "Or..."

"Or," Ava chimed in softly and reluctantly, "Kivar's people might have attacked them in sufficiently unearthly a way that there isn't even a body left. Humans probably wouldn't be able to come to terms with that, so officially they'd be 'unaccounted for.'"

"Alright," Max said. It seemed like a very good idea that they start doing something instead of dwelling on this news, but he wasn't entirely sure what. He was partly sure, though. "Alright, we split up now. I'm in the van, along with anybody else who wants to break into Madison's house and investigate it. The rest of you..." He sighed. "I'm not sure, but be ready to leave town at a moment's notice, anywhere in a northward or eastward direction. And nobody get in Alex's way as he goes over that Smith brothers data."

Isabel laughed. "Okay, your majesty. I'll protect him."

"I think Rath and I should be on your break-in team," Ava suggested. "And Mister Valenti, of course."

"Just great," Jim muttered. "I go from lawman to common crook." Max looked at him, and he shrugged - not really objecting seriously.

"Who else, if anyone?" Rath asked. "I think we can take one more, without getting too unwieldy for a covert op. Umm... Kyle? Parker?"

Liz smiled slightly. "Yeah, I'll come along I guess." They waited just long enough for Michael to spread out a map and agree on a primary rendezvous point, (it could always be changed by cell phone, but Max thought it made sense to agree to something,) and then the break-in team were off looking for the address that Alex provided them with.

Ava stared up at the house. "Okay, so any idea how we're supposed to break in when the guy's wife and little kid are home?"

Max shook his head and couldn't help but laugh at himself. "I must admit, I didn't anticipate this possibility, and I probably should have." It was pretty clear that lights were on inside, even in the noon sunshine, and a little boy of about four or five with sand-brown hair was playing with toy trucks and a shovel in the front yard. Max wouldn't have thought that either Mister Madison or his wife would have liked their little boy to dig up the immaculate lawn like he seemed to be doing - wasn't that what sand boxes in the back yard were for? Also, there was a fairly wide picture window in the front of the house, showing a living room, and there had been a few sightings of a pretty blonde woman, maybe in her late twenties, wearing slightly preppy casuals and hurrying back and forth doing something that Max hadn't been quite able to make out... sorting mail? Getting bills ready to pay, or some other kind of paperwork?

"Alright, let's take a step back," Jim said. "Breaking in doesn't sound like a safe option, but then, it isn't really required. We **thought** that we'd have to break in to find out any clues that were at Madison's home, because we didn't expect that anybody would be home. Now that someone's home, we just need to find a pretext to get someone into the house... to talk to the wife, maybe, and poke around as much as possible without attracting attention."

"Makes some sense," Liz said. "Do you think it's possible that the girl is an alien? Maybe our shape-shifter or another... um, I don't know, I have to admit."

"Possible, yes," Rath replied. "Likely - no, though I couldn't say why."

"I agree that it's not the likeliest answer," Ava said, "but not that slim a chance, either. Maybe odds of three-to-one against of her being somehow unearthly - shifter, skin, hybrid, or something else." She sighed. "Whoever goes in should make sure to touch her and try to get a flash. That might be the best kind of info we can get, though I admit I'm not sure what the flash might be of."

"Okay," Jim thought about that. "Well, how about a fairly simple ruse? One of you could pretend to be an old friend of Jason's?" He considered. "Max, you could kinduv pass for a twenty-something if she isn't looking too hard."

"Hmm." Max muttered. "I'd like to prepare a bit more before trying a trick like that... what if I say the wrong thing about... about where we went to school together, or whatever?"

"As it happens, I can help with that," Rath said, producing a few pages with a flourish. "This is part of the stuff that Alex pulled off the broadcast network back there. The company newsletter included a spotlight on Mister Madison, with some biographical background."

"Wow, that's kind of lucky," Ava pointed out.

"About time we caught some kind of a break," Liz replied. She scanned the papers before passing them on to Max. "Think that'll help?"

"Hmm, yeah maybe," Max said. "I'll want someone with me as backup... maybe a fiancee who I'd brought over to introduce to Jason, who has apparently forgotten that we made plans that he'd come home from the office for lunch?" He smiled and focused on Liz. "How do you feel about the role?"

"The girl who's going to marry you?" Liz repeated. "Just try and stop me."

So after quickly cribbing from the bio and memorizing as much as he could, (Liz looked at it too, but didn't bother with it as much as Max did - as the fiancee, she didn't need to know so much about Jason,) they headed up the walk, trying to only look a little nervous. "Umm, hi," Max said when blonde wife answered the door. "I'm, umm, I'm a friend of Jason's from Notre Dame. Just, err, kind of passing through today, and -"

"Jason isn't home, he's at the office," she replied.

"Yeah, I, umm, I kind of realized that," Max continued. "I called this morning; he said that he might be able to make it home in, umm, in about half an hour. I - I know that we're early, but I wanted to meet the girl that he fell so madly in love with. Uhh... my name's Bill Fordman and this is my fiance Anna Morrow. You would be..."

"Jennifer," Liz suddenly blurted out, and the woman blinked slightly in surprise.

"Yeah," she replied. "So... so Jason told you about me, then?"

"Just a little," Max said awkwardly. "Could... could we come in for a moment?"

"Sure I guess. Umm, but I hope that you won't mind if I call in. Jason might not be able to take the call right now, but I thought I'd try." Jennifer Madison scooped up a cordless phone and dialled so quickly that Max couldn't think of any objection. But after holding the earpiece up to the side of her head for only a few minutes, she hung back up again. "Busy signal - that's weird. Normally they have at least one available line in." Max blinked in surprise. It had been hard for him to hear the phone, but he had been pretty sure that he'd been able to make out a few rings and the start of a recorded welcome message. And then he wondered if Ava or Rath had been able to trick Jennifer into thinking that she'd heard a busy signal, to keep their cover from being blown too soon. "Is that your van out there, parked half behind our hedges?"

"Um, no," Liz replied, though Max wasn't quite sure why she was denying it. Maybe she worried that Jennifer could see other people there. "It, it was there when we walked up - we parked a little further down, because we weren't completely sure of the house number."

"Oh, alright," Jenn looked moodily out the window for a long moment. "So..."

"Where are you from, Jennifer?" Max asked as brightly as he could. Jenn blinked slightly. "Sorry, I just have so many questions - thought it'd be good to get started. Just let me know when it's an overload."

"Well, let's see, I grew up in the country, North Pennsylvania near Lake Erie," she said slowly. "Went to Penn state after graduating high school, and... oh, come on, why don't you sit down if we're going to be talking a lot?" Jenn didn't seem to have any leftover suspicion of their sudden arrival. "Over here." She reached out to touch Max's hand to lead him over to the furniture, and without him even remembering Ava's words, he felt a rush of images and puzzling facts as soon as their skin touched.


	7. Chapter 7: Leaving Louisville

Max gasped as the flash from Jennifer Madison hit him. He tried not to gasp or give any sign of the sudden sensory overload, and to make sense of what he was seeing as much as possible. The old lady - it had to be the old lady that the guy in the nightclub in Dallas had told them about, smiling - and standing on the stairs near the front door of the Madison house, right where Max and Liz had entered. A picture of a blonde girl, possibly Jennifer herself, around eleven or so, lying horribly hurt on a stretch of rough concrete. No one single wound on her body, like a gunshot or a knife entry... but almost all of her limbs broken, bleeding in several places, and her head - well, something looked very bad about the little girl's head, but Max couldn't tell what immediately. Then, another image of the girl from the same age, perfectly healthy and whole - and looking at a glowing silver handprint on her stomach. She quickly rearranged her shirt to cover the mark and hurried out to join a bunch of other kids, in front of... of a building that seemed familiar to Max, vaguely, though he couldn't immediately place it. Jennifer again, in her late teens or just over twenty, talking and flirting with a younger guy, definitely still in his teens, on a college campus.

And then, the images stopped, and Max tried to readjust. He... he was sitting on the couch, with Liz right next to him. "So how did you meet Jason?" she asked.

"Well, it's a bit weird that you don't know, or that we never met while he was at school," Jennifer said, seeming a bit nonplussed. Had she felt any of what he was seeing in the flash? Had she seen something of him, too? "I... I met Jason while he was still in high school, I was a few years ahead of him and going to U Pittsburgh at the time."

"Right, he grew up there in Pittsburgh," Max said. He actually knew that from the biographical info they'd read, but it was so hard to keep up and sound like all of this was incredibly familiar to him. "And so - you guys saw each other long distance once he went off to Notre Dame, and you were back in Pennsylvania."

"Right," Jenn replied, sounding even more suspicious now. "And... and after I graduated, I had a simple job doing filing for a company there in Pittsburgh - until he graduated, and got a job offer down here in Louisville." She smiled a bit at the memory. "He asked me to marry him then, and we moved down here together." She sighed. "I was over to Indiana quite a few times, and I made a bunch of his friends, but I really can't place you, 'Bill.'"

Max squeezed Liz's hand, hoping that she'd get the message. He had - well, he had about as much as he thought that he'd get from Jennifer, just from the flash and a few other things that she'd dropped in conversation. The plot was starting to fall into place - but he needed to get out of here, well out of Louisville before Robert and Jennifer found out that 'Bill' and 'Anna' weren't who they seemed - and before they could tell the old lady. For a second Max thought about coming clean about whom they really were, but he couldn't risk it. The old lady, the shape-shifter... Jennifer definitely knew her, and probably knew her secret - she was definitely an alien, and if she were definitely a friendly alien, then Max could feel confident about laying his cards out on the table. But if there was any chance that she was an enemy, maybe even in Kivar's pay - no. Liz squeezed back, and he hoped that she understood.

All of a sudden, Max's phone rang. Puzzled, he pulled it out - and it was Mister Valenti. Was this a warning of some kind of trouble, or had they just been able to figure out somehow that Max needed an excuse to leave him in a hurry and called him so that he could make up one as he pleased. So Max pulled it out, and got into a very heated one-sided argument with Valenti, who didn't really bother arguing back. "Well, I'm afraid lunch is off," he said to Liz (Anna) and Jennifer regretfully. "That was my boss' boss - something went wrong with -" Umm, what the heck could it be? "With the service level numbers; I'm supposed to get to an internet cafe for a teleconference tout de suite."

"You can probably plug a laptop into our high-speed switcher," Jennifer volunteered uncertainly.

"No, thanks, that's sweet, but it's better to do this by the book," Liz said. "Nice to meet you and all, and please send our regrets to Jason." She and Max made their exit quickly, and hurried back up the walk, passing Jennifer's son, who was passing them by, waving with a little hand and hurrying off to say hi to his Mommy. Liz suddenly reached out her hand to ruffle the boy's pale gold hair as the two of them came near - and she stumbled hard, Max catching her so that she didn't land on the front walk paving.

"Flash?" he whispered to her. Liz nodded. "Okay, wait until we're off."

Liz nodded. Together, they turned at the sidewalk, and Jennifer wasn't looking out at them, so Max figured it wasn't worth the trouble of walking past the van and out of sight. "Wow, what happened?" Ava asked. "I... I could tell that you were done already, but..."

"Drive," Max said. "And, and call the others, have them leave. No time to worry about rendezvous, we just all need to get out of town as soon as possible." He gave Liz a hand inside, panting. "Let's head for Pittsburgh, whichever way that is."

"Pittsburgh?" Liz repeated, as Rath put the car in gear and screamed away. "Because... because that's where Jennifer and Jason met?"

"Not - not just that," Max insisted. "There... there was a place I saw in the flash I got from Jennifer. I'm pretty sure that that was in Pittsburgh too." He took a deep breath. "Liz... Jennifer nearly died - when she was eleven or twelve. There... there was a field trip, I don't know all the details, but she fell from a great height. And - and an alien..."

"Saved her life," Liz breathed, seeing it. "Was there a handprint on her in the flash?" Surprised, Max nodded. "Presumably, that's the she-shifter that we're looking for. Call... call her Shana, just for the sake of convenience."

"Catchy," Ava told her. "Okay, so Shana saves her life, and... and now she's posing as Jenni's mother?" Max nodded. "And mind-warping Jenni's husband, at least once, to cover something - possibly something she did at Jason's company."

"Right," Max agreed. "The field trip was... was at a museum in Pittsburgh, I think. Want to look up a picture of it somehow, to make sure, but..."

"Alex can stop at a net cafe, the next big town that we come to," Jim suggested. "Which probably won't be until Cincinnati."

"Fine by me," Max told him. Liz giggled, and Max chuckled too, when he remembered that he'd told Jenni he had to go to an internet cafe. "Well, between the museum, and Jenni going to the university at Pittsburgh..."

"We still have an even slimmer lead to dig up than we did here in Louisville, looking for Shana," Rath pointed out. "That's pretty much nothing."

"Unless," Liz chimed in. "Jenn is probably going to mention her visitors to Jason, and they'll compare notes, Jason will probably connect you talking to Jenni with your visit to him at his office, Max," Liz put in. "And he'll know that you were trying to find Jenni's 'mother' - Shana. She'll probably tell Shana about us, if she has any way to get a message to her... and Shana might come looking for us. Pittsburgh is about as likely a place as anywhere for her to try to intercept us. She'll know that we know that Jason and Jenni met there."

"Oh, that's a reassuring thought, Liz," Rath put in. "We don't need to know where to look for this alien shape-shifter, a possible enemy, because she'll be looking for us." Liz shrugged, a mix of apology and insolence in the gesture.

"Well, it is a good point," Max decided reluctantly. "One more thing we have to worry about - and a possible opportunity. Shana might not be an enemy, or if she is we might be able to get the upper hand on her, if we're careful and keep good watch, and then we might be able to find out some useful stuff."

"Yeah, 'cause driving all day and all night really lends itself to keeping good watch," Ava pointed out.

"Maybe we shouldn't be driving all day and all night until we get to Pittsburgh, then," Liz suggested. "We could find someplace to stay put halfway - near Columbus maybe - and have a bit longer of a rest break."

"It's an idea," Max decided. "Of course, a few people are going to have to stay up and keep watch even then, but every little bit helps."

Jim Valenti hung up his cell phone. "They're on their way, ahead of us and nearly back to the interstate," he reported. "Any possible pursuit we should really be worried about at this point?"

Max thought. "Doesn't seem likely I suppose - but eyes open couldn't hurt." He sighed and tried to turn around and scan the traffic behind them. Liz leaned in close, her side pressing warmly against his.

"Okay, I have a question," Valenti announced. "You might none of you be able to answer it, but here goes anyway. Can alien shape-shifter go, erm, across genders, or can a male shape-shifter only go into men, or boys possibly, and vice versa?"

There was a long silence. "Our protector was only dudes as far I knew," Rath said, "but we never saw much of him."

Ava sighed. "Tess might have known more, but she's not available."

Max cleared his throat. "Actually, Tess told me some stuff about growing up with Nasedo last spring - while she was making a concerted effort to seduce my confidence." He sighed. "The information isn't one hundred percent wholly dependable, I guess, but I don't really see any reason she'd have fibbed on this subject." He sighed.

Before Max could continue, Liz mentioned, "Somehow I don't really see 'fib' as the right word for Tess deceiving you about anything. Maybe just because it implies an inexperienced or infrequent liar."

"Rrrowr," Ava teased Liz playfully, and Liz blushed slightly, knowing that Ava didn't have much affection for her identical worser half, and if Ava thought she was being even a little catty, she'd probably gone too far.

"Well anyway, what did the Tess monster have to say?" Rath asked, hardly bothering to mask his laughter. "About Ed going around as a woman."

"He'd done it once or twice - a woman's face and hair, at least. But he seemed to have more trouble with a woman's body type, because he'd wear a heavy, shapeless trench-coat or something that didn't show off a figure when he was doing it. He didn't have the same problem becoming skinny or muscular or fat, as a guy."

"Hmm, that's interesting," Valenti said. "You'd think that a woman's body type would be easier than the face."

"Oh, I don't know," Rath countered. "First, practice. If he'd mimicked a bunch of different guy heads, there wouldn't be much in the way of a chick's face that wouldn't prepare him for. Second, maybe it's just easier for shape-shifters to pick up faces in general."

"Third," Ava chimed in, "you can get better feedback on your face, using any kind of simple mirror. Maybe put the picture of who you want to be right up against the mirror for comparison."

"Well, whatever," Liz said, sighing. "I'm a bit depressed now. Is there any chocolate here in the van?"

"Umm, here," Ava said, picking up a package and tossing it over to Liz - honey filled chocolate balls. "Don't pig out too much though - there's Maxxie boy to think about."

Max, Liz, and Rath all started chuckling at once, remembering the conversation last night that had started in the van when Liz had been eating pizza. Jim shot a look over at Ava, who just shrugged, puzzled but not worrying about it terribly much.

#

An hour and seventeen miles later, Max sighed to himself. The van was still rolling northeast along the interstate, towards Ohio. It was hard for him to grasp how far they'd travelled in less than thirty-six hours. They'd started in the extreme south south-west, and were on their way to cross over from the last of the mid-southern states, (since Kentucky wasn't really that far south, the shallow south perhaps,) into the Midwest. They had crossed nearly half the breadth of the country already, or at least so it seemed.

Ava was driving up front now, but she hadn't taken the wheel before giving the back of the van a bit of a makeover to encourage a slightly homier feeling. Some old blankets had been found in a storage compartment beneath the seats, and these had been hung up against the side windows towards the back to keep too much daylight getting in to allow people to rest, and between the various seats in order to add to a sense of privacy, (although the effect was somewhat lessened by the holes that had to be cut out to make sure that the driver could still see at least a little bit through the rear view mirror.) Rath and Mister Valenti were at opposite ends of the very back seat, probably sleeping. Max and Liz were taking the middle, which didn't allow them much space and forced their bodies closely together, but neither was complaining about _that_. It's all about liking the company, he decided to himself.

"Okay, we're starting to figure out what the story about the girl in the supply closet was about," Max whispered softly to his girl, "though there's still a lot that remains unanswered. I still wonder what that flash of your granny means. It doesn't seem to have any possible connection, and yet I wonder."

"Hmm, yeah, I don't see anything yet," Liz admitted. "Oh, one clue I forgot to tell you about. When I..."

"When you touched the little kid, Jason and Jenni's son, you had a flash," Max filled in. "I could hardly miss the signs. What was it of?"

"Umm... the redheaded girl and Jenni, while she was pregnant," Liz filled in slowly. "Shana, I guess. She gave Jenni a hypodermic needle injection, and waved her hand over her belly, and, umm... I'm not sure of the details, but something that Jenni had to be up in the stirrups for." Max blinked, surprised. "And... and there were words somewhere... maybe on the wall, or - I'm not quite sure. But they read 'Brazel W institute.'"

"Brazel?" Max repeated. "Dammit, I know I should recognize that... that name, but I don't." He sighed. "Was that it?"

"Umm... no, that's not quite all." Liz sighed. "Something... there was something that was hard to make out, but oddly familiar. A view of cells, like in a microscope. Cells that were nearly human, but not quite. Closer than yours, though."

"Huh?" Max tried to fit this one in. "So... so Jenni's son... is part alien? Shana changed his cellular structure while he was still unborn?"

"That's... that's what it seems like to me," Liz admitted. "I - I wonder what reason she might have had."

Max shrugged, and leaned ever closer to Liz. "Okay, that's enough about Jenni and **her** wacky alien friends." Liz laughed. Max kissed her, and reached out to gently stroke his hand against her right breast. Liz broke the kiss, startled, and looked around, as if expecting that someone would be able to see them.

"Oh, Max Evans, you're naughty," she said, so quiet that there was hardly any sound to the words, and Max understood the mostly by the way her lips were moving.

"I didn't think I was the only one," he mouthed, but from the look on Liz's face, she hadn't been able to quite understand all of that. So Max repeated, moving his lips against the skin of her neck not far from her left ear, and letting the sound pass from his lips through her skin, not the air. Liz's giggle sounded very loud to Max, and when he pulled back slightly he could see that she was grinning. Liz's hand ran over Max's own chest, not tarrying long, though she did make a point of scratching over the stretch of shirt that she knew covered one nipple, and then her attention went further down. Not to the point of interest that was already starting to swell, but her hand cupped the curve of Max's narrow hip, then reaching around him to fondle and poke his butt.

"You... you have a delicious looking ass," Liz whispered to him ever so softly. "And it feels damn good, too."

Max hesitated. He had been the one to start this, but now he wasn't sure how far he wanted to take it - Ava was just up ahead, driving, probably very bored and keeping her ears open for anything interesting going on further back in the van. Rath and Mister Valenti might be awake too. It would be embarrassing to try to do anything really pleasing in these circumstances, and Max wasn't sure how far he and Liz could stand to tease each other without getting down to real business... or how frustrating it might be to get caught in between. But Liz raised the stakes without even asking him. When Max clued in to what had happened, Liz was climbing into his lap, a hand reaching behind her to run fingers through Max's hair, her smooth and rounded butt pressing hard against his stiffly trapped rod. "Ohh..." He couldn't even try to stifle the groan until it had already burst through his lips. "What... what about your seat belt, Liz?"

"Umm..." She spoke low, though not as low as he did because her face was away from him now. "I... I could put yours around me too."

"Umm... that might not be the best of ideas," Max mumbled. He was probably getting too uptight. They didn't worry about being strapped into seatbelts in the motor home, partly because it didn't really have any. But then all thoughts of auto safety were driven out of Max's head as Liz took his arm in her hand and brought it close to her, and then... Max couldn't really see how she did it, though he supposed the details weren't that surprising and didn't matter. The upshot was that Liz had led his hand up under her shirt, and his fingers were brushing against the underside of her trim but luscious bosom, and the soft fabric of the bra that was attempting to further restrain it under her shirt. Max bit on the edge of his tongue to keep from crying out. Liz made a softly hushed mumble, and he realized that she was doing something very similar. Her butt was still nearly gyrating back and forth on top of his hips and thighs. Max's hand pushed deeper into the front of Liz's shirt seemingly of its own accord, clutching the tender sensitive flesh, not terribly hard but forcefully enough that Liz felt the contact in a shudder that went all over her body, fingers repeatedly stroking back and forth along a volcanically developing peak on the furthest point of her contoured rolling hills.

Liz's left hand was stroking Max's leg now. "Either... either we have to stop now," Max hissed urgently at her. "Or... or I get to fuck the stuffing out of you right here and now."

"Hmm..." Liz thought about that, turned around to smile at him slightly, and Max could tell in her smile that something good was going to be coming. However, what happened first seemed very disappointing, as Liz stood partly up, holding the blanket in front of them just enough to support her without yanking it down, and got back into the seat next to Max, pulling her seat belt around her lovely body again and snapping the head into its sheath securely. (Darnit, Max was so turned on that he was even starting to see a seat belt fastener in sexual terms... the part attached to the belt being male, and the part that came out of the seat itself being female. Ohhh...) Then Liz reached out for his hand again, bringing it to the side of her face, so his thumb brushed her cheek and his fingers were in her hair. "Concentrate," she said, the single word pronounced out loud, so that it almost startled Max. Of course, it didn't really matter if anyone else heard that, it wasn't dirty or suggestive by itself.

Max tried to think hard, but he wasn't sure what he should be thinking about. Liz got a frustrated look on her face, and Max felt disappointed that he was letting her down, and then _wham_ - a flash hit him. It was... it was the two of them sitting next to each other like they were, but not in a car, belted in. They were... they were on the edge of the bed in the motel room, back in Roswell. In the flash, Liz got back up again quickly, pulled Max's shirt off, and started to plant a line of kisses down the middle of his chest, her hair brushing against his bare skin and her legs pressing slightly against his own. Once she'd gotten down just past his belly button, nearly to his waist, Liz reached out with her hand, caressed a hard bulge underneath his jeans, and started up near his collarbone again, kissing down a second string, this time going straight over his excited nubbin. When the second string of kisses against Max's torso came to an end, she fondled his crotch briefly again, this time slipping her hand down in between Max's jeans and his underpants, and kissed him hotly, mouth to mouth, her nimble tongue playing with his and letting itself get tagged. Then she backed away just slightly, her sweet breath hitting Max's face - and that was where the flash ended. Max was so turned on he nearly wanted to scream, but he was impressed with Liz's idea. Sex, or sex-play at least, via flash. He forced himself to calm down and breathe deeply as well as he could, formulated a fantasy that he hoped that Liz would like, and reached out again to send it back to her.

Liz gasped in excitement, and Max wondered if he'd let out a noise without even realizing it as the flash hit him too. Oh well, he didn't care **that** much about disturbing the others. He couldn't see the details of what was going on in his own flash, which was a little disappointing, since it was one that he'd have loved to experience in full detail at least as much as Liz would be enjoying it. But, since he'd originated the flash, he knew that he was reaching out, stroking and caressing Liz as he took off her own shirt and her bra, gently pinching the tips of her bare breasts, and sucking even more delicately on her sweet skin. Liz opened her eyes, stared right at him, and he could see that her pupils were dilating slightly, her stare was hot and aimed so tightly at him that he could almost feel scorch marks. "Alright, try this."

They started to send more and more explicit imagery back... and Max felt oddly as if there were two Maxes and two Lizzes - linked by mental connections so that the two of them here in the car could feel everything that their imaginary counterparts did in the motel room. More and more clothes were stripped away, lips were put to use in inventive and exciting places, and eventually they sent three different flashes back and forth of full-on sexual congress - with Liz on top of Max. Max opened his eyes after one of these flashes with a wet, clammy feeling spreading through his undershorts, and the stiff rod in his crotch starting to relax slightly - he knew that he was done, and well satisfied with it. But Liz obviously hadn't gotten off herself yet, and hopefully one really good burst would do it. Of course, just because Max didn't really have a stiff and solid cock to give her, that didn't mean that his alter-ego wasn't still up to the task. (Handy benefit of this routine!) He heard Liz yell out piercingly in the fantasy, and let out a much softer cry in reality, and felt her convulsing on top of him, then collapse and snuggle close to him... both on the bed, and on the car seat.

"Is there going to be a gas stop soon?" Liz called out loud. "Max and I both kinda need to, umm, go to the bathroom."

#

"Hmm," Alex said, nodding at Max. "We need to find a big, famous art history museum in Pittsburgh? I... I don't know about it myself, but if you're on target, it shouldn't take too long to figure out what its name is from the net - and get a picture." He sighed. "Once we get to somewhere that we can get on the net from."

"Cool," Liz decided. The cars had both stopped for pizza near the middle of nowhere... except that this particular roadside pizza establishment was apparently as popular and impressive as to almost qualify as 'somewhere' all by itself. There had been a turnoff to a parking lot on one side of the highway, and at the corner of the parking lot the entrance to a passenger bridge built over the highway - they had climbed several flights of stairs, walked across and looked out through glass walls at the cars zooming each way down the interstate. On the other side, the bridge led onto a wide field of picnic tables, and on the other end of the field was the bakery and customer service center, and then there was a rather smaller parking lot. Max wasn't sure for the disparity in the sizes of the parking lot... possibly a lot more people stopped here for pizza when going northeast than southwest, just because that way they got to walk over the bridge.

"Did you find anything else interesting in the material you downloaded from the office network, Alex?" Jim Valenti asked. To make up for having been stuck in different vehicles on the drive out of Louisville, he and Amy were eating with one arm around each other, which was something Max hadn't even thought of with Liz, no matter how close they were lately. Food was something he still felt he needed two hands to deal with usually.

"Umm, yeah, kinduv," Alex admitted, looking over at Isabel sitting next to him and then at his slice with pepperoni, Canadian bacon and olives. "The company does a lot of work in telecommunications, especially cellular phone networks. Repairing transceiver towers, helping to build new ones; that kind of thing. They would have some limited access to national communication lines, and that's probably the most important reason why a... why 'Shana' would be interested in them. But I'm not sure this helps us track her down any."

"We could look for other important companies or sites to do with telecom in other cities," Isabel pointed out. "Like in Pittsburgh."

"Alright," Max agreed. "Now, does anybody know why the name Brazel would be familiar to me?"

"You're joking, right?" Michael asked. Max turned to him. "Sheesh, all that time working at the museum and you can't keep the basic facts about the Roswell crash in your head? Mac Brazel was the rancher who first reported debris from a crash to the air force."

"Oh, my god," Max muttered. "How could I have missed that connection? William W Brazel. The Brazel W Institute." He sighed. "But still, it doesn't entirely make sense. Who would name... some sort of a medical institute after Brazel, and - and experiment in making the unborn children of human parents partially alien?"

"Whaa?" Maria asked. "Max, sorry, you've lost us badly. Go back and do the catch-up thing?" So, between them, Max and Liz rehashed the flash that Liz had seen touching the little kid in the Madison's front yard, about Jenni getting an injection while she was pregnant and other stuff, and a view of partially alien cells.

"That... that's not a lot to go on for such big assumptions," Isabel commented. Max looked up at her. "Just saying - I mean, I thought that Laurie was an alien when I first touched her and got a flash."

"Heih?" Laurie commented in a nasal interrogative. "You... you did?" She tried to cast her mind back through those traumatic weeks. "When... when you and Max and Jim first found me and dug me up?"

"Yeah," Isabel asserted. "You... you thanked me for saving your life... I'm glad I helped, though I can't take all the credit." Laurie smiled. "But... but what I saw in the flash wasn't you, it was the aliens that were after you. The Gandarium parasites. Liz, you might be misunderstanding what you saw the same way."

"Yeah," Liz agreed. "But can you think of another interpretation? I'm just rolling with the only thing I've got at the moment." There was an awkward silence after that.

"Well," Alex suggested, "we need to find more information about the Brazel W Institute, like where it is and maybe who's involved in it, and all the signs point to it not being something I can just look up easily on Google. So, well, who do we know who might know?"

"I... I have a contact, of some sort," Max said, smiling. "Hope that he wasn't hurt when Kivar blew through Roswell, and that I can get in touch without giving away our location."

"Right," Liz agreed. "By the way, guys, Lonnie called Rath back about half an hour ago." Everybody who had been in the motor home reacted to this news with surprise and relatively little positive enthusiasm.

"How... what did she say?" Kyle asked.

"Not - not too much," Rath answered. "I did most of the talking, telling her the situation and roughly what we were about. Then - well, she said thanks and just hung up. I admit I was a little surprised not to get more of a reaction out of her."

"Do you think something might have happened to her?" Isabel asked, a grudging concern underlying her words.

"Maybe, but I doubt it. Probably she's still steamed at me for throwing in with you guys... or she wanted to think of her own move without me bugging her." Rath shrugged. "I've told her what's what, at least."

"How... how much did you tell her about where we were and where we'd be going?" Alex asked. Rath made a bit of a face at him. "That much, huh?"

"She knows enough that she could meet up with us if she wants. In fact..." Rath looked over at Ava. "Our route to Pittsburgh takes us through Columbus, right?"

"Yeah, wh- ohh." Ava nodded. "Did you tell her - yeah, I actually remember that now. You mentioned the name of that dive where _we_ ran into each other in Columbus. She can probably find it. Which means - she might wait there as a way of leaving things up to us. If we stop and go in there, then it's a signal that we'd be interested in having her join up - if she's there too. If we don't want to worry about her, then we stop in any joint we want to in Columbus but that one."

"And... and she can probably reach Columbus before we get there," Rath agreed. "She said she was in Buffalo - what she'd be doing there I don't know. But that sort of implied deal is the way her mind works. Nothing said out loud."

"Well, I guess you'd know a lot about how Lonnie's mind works," Amy said pointedly. "Considering some of the dirty deeds you pulled off together. Is there any reason **why** we should take someone like that with us?"

There was a long silence in reply to that - not even Rath tried to argue in Lonnie's defence... but he seemed faintly defiant even in his silence. "Well, come on, let's finish eating up and head for Cincinnati," Max said. "I... I think I have a notion about how to get a message to Brody asking about this institute, but we'll need email for that, not just a cell phone."

"I think I might be able to get you email **through** a cell phone," Alex replied. "If I can find an eight hundred number for my dial-up internet service."

"Let me guess," Jim replied. "You got a cellular modem along with all that other stuff in Abilene?"

"Yeah, didn't seem like it was worth the trouble to get it set up before," the young computer whiz replied. "Frankly I half forgot about it. But it seemed like it just might be useful."

"Okay, then I'll be in the motor-home for the next leg with Alex and the laptop, Max said. Rath, Ava, are you guys okay for staying in the van?" They agreed that they were, along with Jim, and Amy. Maria and Kyle volunteered for driving the motor-home, and Michael said that he'd try to catch some z's in the sleeping chamber. Everyone seemed pretty satisfied with that arrangement.

As they were clearing the table to throw the empty pizza boxes and paper plates and coke cans away (or toss them into recycling bins, as appropriate,) Kyle reached out for a folded piece of paper, looked curiously at it, and then tossed it away as if it were hot. "What is it?" Ava asked.

"Who... who put this there?" he asked. Several of his friends traded glances, but nobody said anything or made a gesture of accepting responsibility. "Somebody... somebody, I dearly hope, was playing a joke on me, and I want them to admit to it _right now_!"

More bemused looks. Ava and Liz, who had been the ones next to Kyle, both quietly said 'not me' or 'not I', and Michael shook his head. "Umm... do you mind?" Max asked, reaching out for the paper himself. Kyle seemed much too shaken to reply, so Max felt he was justified in examining the item in question, purely with a view to resolving the issue that seemed to be upsetting him so much, of course. No element of insensitive curiosity played on his mind.

The paper was probably a sheet of eight and a half by eleven typing paper, carefully folded into one eighth of its usual size so that it didn't take up much area, and was reasonably thick as a packet. On one of the exposed sections, in a slightly showy and girlish script, was printed the following:

_Astro-mail_

To: Kyle Adam Valenti

From: Tess

_Personal information_. Do not forward blind. Do not read except at addressee's direction.

"Whoa," Max muttered. He could certainly understand why Kyle might be upset at even the thought that Tess was contacting him. Max would feel the same. And it was certainly an odd device. If Tess **had** originated this, how had she gotten it here? Where had the physical paper come from?

"If... if I'd done this, I'd tell you so," Max admitted. "At least, if I remembered doing it. I... I think I can say the same for everyone here." He left the other alternative unspoken.

"Before, before we found out," Kyle choked out, "The - well, the way things went down, I never expected that she'd still take me up on it." He groaned. "I - I don't really want to open and read it."

"Hmm?" Rath had apparently read the header information over Max's shoulder. "Well, I can torch it for you if you want. That'd solve the problem. Although she might try again, I don't know if there's any way to stop that. I wouldn't have thought she'd be able to do it at all."

"No, no, don't destroy it," Kyle insisted. "That... well, that was only part of the truth; that I didn't want to read it. Part of me does... and part of me doesn't want to **not** read it." Liz stepped up and put her hand in Kyle's, a very supportive friendly gesture. "Maybe I'll just keep it for a while until I'm ready. Or - or maybe I should just do it now and get it over with."

"What... whatever you want to do," Liz insisted. Ava had a very conflicted look on her face, like she was dying to give Kyle a friendly hug and wasn't sure if he'd push her away because her resemblance to Tess would just confuse his already tormented emotions further. "But... but, with all due sympathy to what you're going through, we should probably get going if you're not going to read it just this second."

"I... I can keep Maria company as she drives," Michael said. "You don't need to worry about keeping your eyes on the road at the same time as you're angsting about **this.**" Everybody seemed to have figured out the basics of what the note entailed by now.

"Umm... thanks, but I'm doing it now," Kyle suddenly decided. Quickly he opened up the paper and read through it. Not much time passed, but every second seemed like at least a minute to the people who were watching Kyle's eyes scan the paper. "All right." He folded it up, just once, and started to lead the way back to the pedestrian bridge.

The table had all been cleared, so Max shrugged and followed, catching Liz gently in his encircling arm and holding her close to him as he walked. "Evans," Kyle called, and somehow Max had no doubt that the name was a reference to him and not Isabel. With Kyle, it always meant him. "You... you should probably read this too."

Max swallowed. "You sure, man?"

"Yeah. Guess it won't be easy for you, any more than it was for me, but... but that's just the way things go." Max shrugged, tried to catch up with Kyle, but he was walking faster than Liz seemed to want to go, and Max did **not** want to let go of Liz to get a message from Tess. The symbolism of that would be way too on the nose. But Kyle started to wait up around the point he was climbing the bridge stairs, and Max reached out for the letter, very deliberately unfolding it with one hand in such a way that Liz could read it if she wanted to. But Liz turned her face away, probably because thought it was significant that **Kyle** hadn't granted her permission. Max sighed and began to scan the page. For a second his mind refused to focus on the meaning of the words, instead, as a diversionary tactic, scrutinizing the details of the typing itself, which looked like it might have come out of a pretty good laser printer, except that the paper didn't seem to be laser paper. Probably the letters had been burned into the paper by different means entirely, but no computer could have formed the characters with more elegant regularity. Max wondered if the typeface would match a commonly available font on the kind of home computers they all used.

And then, when such observations had come to an end, the words themselves intruded on Max's awareness.

My dear Kyle,

I hope you don't mind that I actually did send you a letter. Everything has changed since we said goodbye, but I've had a lot of time here to think about my misdeeds. Killing Alex is something that will always weigh heavy on my soul... and deceiving Max, trying to use him for my own purposes while proclaiming my love for him. And yet, no matter how great these grand and obvious regrets are, in my heart they are equalled by one that might not seem so obvious - that I pushed you away.

"I confess this to you now: at the prom, when I saw the amount of angsty tension that was stretching between Max and Liz, I saw an opportunity to begin my mission. And, because I couldn't make good progress with Max while I the two of us were together, I 'pushed' you into saying those things about being my sister. Even though I was behind them, it broke my heart to hear you say the words. I also used my powers to 'nudge' Liz into admitting some things she felt that she wouldn't have ordinarily said to Max, things that would finalize the rift between them.

"So... even though we're on different planets about four hundred light years away from each other, and might neither of us be able to cross those empty spaces and meet again, it seems very important to know if the distance between your heart and mine would be even further. Because I love you very much, Kyle, and I know that there might not be any part of you that still loves me. Max's son is growing within me. He will be healthy and happy when he grows up, but he will never be mine - maybe he'll be the foster son of the old Queen. Or maybe Max and Liz will be able to raise him as their own, if Liz can look beyond the circumstances of his conception and love him for the precious little boy that he's going to be.

"I... I don't know if you'll be able to send a reply back to me soon, or at all. It was hard enough to get this 'letter' to earth, and I'm not sure if I'll be able to reach it to you, or if you'll read it once you realize that it actually is from me. But still, I will be waiting to hear your voice, or to read words and know that they came from you. I'm good at waiting, and I've had lots of practice.

"From what I've heard, you'll be having some problems back there. My best wishes are with you, but they are all that I can offer you, aside from this advice, for what little it's worth: I think that all the 'club' needs to find a way to leave Earth - or at least the core group. Some other way than the Granilith, since Kivar wants it so much that risking it in open space is probably self defeating. I'm not sure of what way that might be - but if you see an opportunity, you can't afford to let it pass by without investigation.

Tess."

Max sighed and folded the paper up into fours. Kyle's reply to Tess' question was pretty much none of his business. He was glad that Kyle had let him see the letter, though, for the revelation about Tess' further meddling in his relationship with Liz, (at a point when he hadn't really expected it,) and for the parts about the baby. The idea of he and Liz raising the child together seemed bizarre, but as usual, he had to admit that much stranger things had had...

Preoccupied with his thoughts about the letter, Max stepped out over the first step of the 'down' stairwell at the other side of the passenger bridge, instead of stepping down onto it, and lost his balance quite badly, taking Liz with him, (because his arm was still around her,) and knocking into Kyle, just in front of both of them, and making him stumble. Soon they were tumbling in an ungainly heap down the flight... and came to an awkward stop halfway down. "Yikes!" Liz exclaimed "Everyone okay?"

"Umm, I'm bleeding," Kyle muttered. "Cut myself on a stair, just over the temple, but it doesn't seem too bad."

"My knee hurts like hell," Max admitted. "And my arm is probably one big bruise. But that doesn't seem like much to worry about. You, darling?"

"Umm... think I managed to stay whole - ohh." Just as Max managed to move around enough to get a look at Liz's face, the two of them seemed to recognize that Liz had acquired an ugly scrape on one of her apple cheeks. "Umm... okay, we've got company."

Sure enough, not only had the rest of the gang gathered in concern at the top of the stairs, but a family with a rather large crowd of children had been making their way _up_ the stairs and must have realized by now that something had gone wrong. "Dammit, no time to worry about healing anything before they see us," He managed to pull himself carefully to his feet, aided by Liz, while Kyle extricated himself and pulled himself up using the stairs' hand railing.

Just then, the parents of the family below came into view. "Is... is everything okay up there?" the father asked worriedly. "Is there some instability in the stairs?"

"And do you guys need any help?" the mother added. "First aid, or calling an ambulance..."

"No, the stairs are fine," Max replied, "As long as you use them correctly and carefully, which I guess I managed to mess up, and pull my friends along for a little ride." He sighed. "As far as first aid, we can take care of that back in our vehicle."

"Alright." There was some kafuffle, first allowing the family tribe to pass through, and then for Max himself to try climbing down a few stairs on his injured knee. That hurt very badly and the leg was unsteady enough to be completely worthless, so he concentrated, slipping into a healing trance and altering the molecules and living cells that made up the knee ligament enough that it was partially healed. Then they tromped off towards the motor home.

#

TruAbductee2: Hey, Evans, how goes the road trip?

Max blinked in surprise a bit as the instant message window popped up on the screen of Alex's laptop. Alex had gotten the cellular modem working, and signed onto a Belgian anonymizer proxy service, in order to make it more difficult for anyone to trace their internet signal to this particular part of Ohio. He'd dropped a message to one of Brody's email boxes and a UFO abductees' message board that he frequented, telling him how to contact Alex's laptop via an instant message chat program. It had only been about three minutes before he replied - well, maybe five and a half from when the email had been sent.

SoulMPark: Yeah, thanks for getting back to me so man. The open road is great, but I've got a question. Need to know where we could find the Brazel W institute, and if they do anything in our field.

TrueAbductee2: Brazel? As in - well, I guess that'd be what you're asking me about. Name sounds a bit familiar - let me run it through the database. Is there a period after the w, or just 'Brazel W institute'?"

I looked over at Liz, who had come to sit next to me, and she screwed up her head in thought, and then shook her head. "I... I couldn't tell. Shana's head was right in the way of where the W would be if there was one." Huh - last time she hadn't even been sure if it was on the wall or not - this certainly sounded like it.

SoulMPark: We're not sure. Try both?

TruAbductee2: Already on it. No matches so far.

SoulMPark: Thanks. How... how have things been back in town lately?

TruAbductee2: Exciting enough for me to make like the Chinese and wish to live in a dull era. You've probably heard about the dangerous criminals who came through town?

SoulMPark: Yeah, of course, it's been on the radio everywhere.

(The latest update Max and the others had heard had put the invaders as already in West Tennessee, and gaining. At this rate, it might not be safe to stop in a campsite near Columbus, the way Max had been hoping too.)

TruAbductee2: Well, the good news is that I don't think anyone you're close to was badly hurt. The not-so-good news is that not all of them really left town.

"Uh-oh," Liz muttered.

TruAbductee2: Oh, here's something. Brazel W Institute. Nobody seems to know the origin of the name, whether it's connected to Mac Brazel, or who owns and controls the private corporation. But it's located in Scranton, PA - and has done work in biotech, communications techniques, and other technology that has aroused the interest of many impressionable members of the field.

SoulMPark: The crackpots have it on their radar, then, and the more mainstream UFOlogists don't worry about it much.

TruAbductee2: Yeah, but I'd put my money on the unashamed crackpots most of the time... well, actually, no, not if we're talking serious money on any one thing, because the crackpots often believe stuff that's absolutely nuts. But I wouldn't write them out of this. There's a partial street address - no number, but Mulder Boulevard.

SoulMPark: Thanks. Keep your head down.

TruAbductee2: I always do. Stay on safe ground.

And with that, Brody had apparently logged off... assuming that that really was Brody, but Max decided it would be paranoid to seriously doubt it. The dialog seemed to fit with the man he knew too well, although IM chat conversations were never perfectly like a spoken dialogue.

"Mulder Avenue?" Liz repeated. "Like the guy from the X files?"

"Ohh." Max hadn't even thought of _that_ connection. "Well, we can look for one anyway. Scranton isn't - well, it's halfway across the state from Pittsburgh, and a fairly long way from Louisville, but it's not too far from the route that we'd be taking to continue up into New England from Pittsburgh."

"Hope that we don't bite off more than we can chew if we go there," Kyle said. "Or, if they're into digital tech, maybe that should be byte off, with a y."

"I'm tired of things just getting more complicated," Max said. Even though he knew that he should be trying to get used to it.

Liz gave him a big tight hug. That kind of helped.


	8. Chapter 8: High in the middle

"Hmm," Alex said, working away at the laptop a little bit longer. They were nearly to Cincinnati, which was where they'd planned to stop and surf the internet, but now that Alex had figured out a way to get them online, however slowly and erratically, while on the road, it was probably just going to be the site of another stretch and switch, purchasing some food and other supplied, and then along the road to Columbus. Whatever forces Kivar had here on Earth, he was heading in their direction, and Max wasn't sure that they could afford to rest. Then again, maybe it would be better to worry about how they were being tracked, (since it hadn't been hard for him to head in their direction so far, it seemed,) and then make a radical course change.

But right now they still had unanswered questions about Pittsburgh to answer. "Okay," Alex said eventually. "I... I think that it's probably one of the Carnegie Institute museums, based on what you told me, Max. Does that sound familiar?"

Max strained slightly at his flash, and the faint memory from years ago that it had connected with. "M- Maybe." Alex had said 'museums,' implying many, not just one, which wasn't something Max was pleased to hear. "How many are there?"

"Um, four or five, it looks like." He tapped around and hit the mouse a few times. "Dammit, nothing has pictures. Not the Encarta online, and not the Carnegie institute's own website." Max tried to open his mouth to say something, but Alex cut him off. "Guess I'm going to have to widen my search pattern. Hang on."

Alright," Max said, and looked over at Liz. She seemed increasingly tense, and Max wished that he could do something to save her from the stress and uncertainty of this chase. But... but there was no way to shield her from what was rushing at them, or the strange mysteries that they were gradually being dragged into. A mystery that, well, that just might have something to do with Liz herself, though Max was far from sure what that connection might be. Liz smiled slightly, and Max realized that it was because she'd recognized the eye contact he'd made. Well, that was something at least.

"Alright," Alex suddenly said, making a few more adjustments to the computer and showing Max a picture on the laptop screen. "The Andy Warhol museum. Is that it?"

Max squinted slightly. The building in the picture looked, to him, more like a small and slightly run-down apartment building than any kind of a museum - white and several stories high. He took an extra second just to be sure. "Not even **close.**"

"Alright." Alex accepted this judgement with equanimity, and didn't seem to lose any confidence from it. "It may take me a few minutes to find a picture of one of the others."

"Alright," Max agreed. Restless, he stalked up to the motor home's cab.

"Hey!" Michael immediately greeted him. "There's unusual news on the radio - if one of you hadn't come up soon I was going to send Maria back." He sighed. "We need some kind of intercom system rigged up in here."

"I'll ask Alex once he's done researching Pittsburgh museums," Max said, though he realized that Alex really needed to be taking a break soon. Maybe he and Isabel could snuggle up somewhere private together... not that Max liked thinking about the details of that kind of thing, even yet, but he could admit on a fairly detached basis that Alex deserved some alone time with the girl he loved, and he couldn't really deny that kind of thing even to Isabel just on the grounds that she was his sister. After all, she might have a weird reaction about Max and Liz, because he was _her_ brother, and he wasn't about to let that stop him.

"Well?" Maria said, prodding Max with two fingers lightly. "Aren't you going to ask us what the news is?"

"Sorry," Max said. "What's happened?"

"Kivar went to Birmingham," Michael said.

Max nearly sat down on nothing at all, and he had to grab wildly at the back of the driver's seat, pulling it hard enough that Michael made a sound of complaint and the course of the motor-home swayed slightly. (Max hoped that Alex had had a good hold of the laptop.) "Birmingham? That... that's not the right direction to go after us, was it?"

"No," Maria agreed. "It definitely isn't. In fact, it seems to be almost directly the wrong direction. From Nashville, we went north towards Louisville, then northwest. You go **South** from Nashville to get to Birmingham. Like in that song 'postmarked Birmingham.'"

"They mention Nashville in that song?" Max asked idly. He'd only heard it once, a few years ago, when country invaded his usual pop/rock stations in the late nineties.

"No, but you can figure it out from the context," Maria said. "'Gone a hundred miles south' is a line in the song, actually, referring to winding up in Birmingham. I was curious enough to figure out where you'd have had to start from to..."

"Okay, I think that we're straying wide of the point," Michael said. "Kivar went the wrong way. And we don't know why..."

"Are we _really_ sure that it's Kivar?" Max asked. "Maybe he figured that we'd be tracing him from news reports and wanted to fake us out, so as to catch us unawares."

"Maybe, I guess I can't be sure," Michael admitted. "But..." All of a sudden, he was interrupted.

"Hey," Liz said, and poked Max in friendly fashion from behind. (Not poking him _on_ his behind, though.) "Alex wants you to look at the laptop again."

Maria shot a look at Max before he left. "Intercom."

"I'll see what we can do," Max said with a sigh, and followed Liz back into the living area of the motor home. When Alex showed him a very different picture, of an institutional, but oddly aesthetic building with brown walls and a series of alternating glass walls and doors leading onto a lobby decked in pale off-white, Max nodded immediately. "That's it. I'm almost sure of it."

"The Carnegie Museum of Art," Alex replied, smiling slightly. "I'll look for pictures of the others, just in case they're close enough to that one to introduce reasonable doubt. But this looks like a good suspect." He took a deep breath. "So, now that we know this, what do we do?"

"Pay a visit to it while we're in Pittsburgh, if we can," Liz said. "Maybe poke around and ask a few questions. What else is there?"

Nobody was sure, and Max filled them in on the new developments vis-a-vis Birmingham. "I'm not sure that that makes much sense as a fake-out," Alex decided.

"I'm not sure that it makes much sense at all," Liz decided. "We should check the radio ourselves, see what we can hear, and maybe find out more details from Michael and Maria. I want to be very cautious about this."

"Take it with a big salt pill?" Isabel asked. She's been sitting on the couch with her eyes closed, so still and silent that Max had wondered if she'd been asleep. Well, apparently if she had been, she wasn't any more. "That makes sense I guess. Everybody seems to agree that K is enormously clever."

"Yeah, despite the fact that nobody really knows that much about him," Alex said. "I mean... well, he seems almost like a cartoon villain sometimes."

"Could you guys keep it down?" Kyle called from the alcove. "I'm trying to sleep here."

"Use earplugs," Isabel replied. "This is important." Kyle grumbled, and Isabel actually picked up a little package of foam ear protectors and zinged it up into the alcove. But somehow nobody could think of anything else to say now that Kyle had complained.

#

"Okay, let's see," Michael muttered, looking around to see if anybody else at Romeo's rendezvous, an Italian restaurant on the edge of Cincinnati, was paying attention to their long table. "Everyone here has a stake in the issue - do we try to rendezvous with Lonnie, or not?" He munched on a few of his long pasta tubes. "We debate first, and then do public voting. Start with the pros and cons?"

"Pros," Rath said slowly. "She knows an awful lot about stuff to do with other aliens on Earth - stuff that she and Zan never told me. She might already know something about Shana."

"And... she's damn good with her powers," Ava chimed in. "Could be the edge we need to survive and escape from an encounter with Kivar, if he manages to catch us after all."

"Con - we don't know how much we can trust her," Max said slowly. "Maybe not at all."

"Pro - refusing to meet her might be putting her in danger," Isabel muttered, though she didn't seem happy about saying that.

"Erm, point of order?" Amy asked in a small, timid voice that didn't seem much like her. "Or, uhh, maybe a point of information, I can never remember which it..."

"We don't do this by Robert's rules or anything, mom," Maria said. "But if you want to ask a question, just go ahead."

"Alright - why is the voting public?" Amy asked. "Maybe... maybe that means people will go the way that they think other people want them to go... or the way that they think they'll least upset other people. There are good reasons for the secret ballot, after all."

"Umm, I guess that's a fair point," Max said. "We started doing it this way informally I guess, and it's sort of become traditional. Though it's been a long time since we've actually had a full roll call vote or anything."

"I like the open voting," Michael decided. "Only the opinions that people are unafraid to state openly get counted that way. Don't really want to have to follow the will of a silent majority that isn't even willing to admit to me who it is."

"Hmm... I'm not sure," Alex admitted. "Both ways have their advantages and disadvantages." He looked around. "Suppose we try doing this one as a written, secret ballot, with the understanding that it isn't to be construed as setting a precedent on its own?"

"I guess," Rath agreed. "Of course, we kind of need to trust that no-one with the power to do so is going to try messing with the ballots."

"Yeah, that's implied," Ava agreed. "We stick by the honour system. Are there any more pros and cons before we start the voting?"

"Con... Lonnie's been working with Kivar's agents before," Kyle said. "What if she tries to sell us all out?"

There was a long pause, and then Jim Valenti pulled out a sheet of paper and small scissors, and started cutting it up. "Everybody just print 'Yea' or 'Nay' on their slip of paper," he said.

"How do you spell Yea?" Rath asked.

"Y-E-A," Ava said in a low voice. "Nay is N-A-Y."

The voting took a while, mostly because there weren't that many blue ballpoint pens to go around, and a lot of the kids were apparently trying to keep their printing from being distinctive. When the slips were counted out, it came out, somewhat to Max's regret, as six Yeas and five Nays. "Okay, so we wait at the diner, I guess," Maria said dully. "Probably hang around Columbus about as long as we can afford to."

"I'm going to need some ice cream for dessert," Liz decided, looking around for a waiter.

#

"Okay, and the teams line up again, now at Miami's twenty-seven yard line - certainly an exciting moment, possibly a dynamic turning point in the entire game that we're looking at. Third down and ten for the..."

"W-what do you mean, Maria?"

Michael reached down and ever so quietly turned down the radio. Max looked over, spared a moment to look into his best friend's eyes, and said nothing, even though a part of him was saying that they shouldn't be doing this. Max drove on. He and Michael were in the front seat of the Jeep now, with Maria and Liz talking in the back. The two girls probably couldn't realize how much of what they were saying was drifting up past the blanket, which was now no longer hung as neatly up across the van as it had once been, and it seemed clear that Michael was turning down the stereo to better eavesdrop on their girlfriends - without turning it off entirely, which could clue Maria in that he was listening. They were nearly halfway to Columbus at this point, driving through the gathering dark of evening, and not many other drivers were sharing the road. Despite the guilty pangs, Max strained slightly to hear the private conversation as well.

"It - it's a pretty simple question, Liz," Maria replied. "When you and Max go off to 'sleep' together, is sleeping all you do? Well, I guess I should qualify it, since I don't think it's very likely that you don't do _anything_ else for a period of time like that." She sighed. "Umm, how far - is there anything that..."

"I, I don't believe this," Liz said a bit stiffly. "You... you guys have been bunking together yourselves since this started... well, not all the time I admit. But - would you want me to ask you if..."

"I don't mind," Maria replied. "Michael makes sweet, sweet love to me, and sometimes not quite so sweet as hot and spicy. He's good at it. I think I'm good at it too, and we have a lot of fun together." There was a little pause. "Oh, come on, Liz; don't look so shocked - you knew that we were doing the deed, right? I didn't think it was possible that anyone in the group didn't know - about how he planned a last night on Earth party with me when he thought he'd have to go forever, and the joke I played on him about being pregnant when he got back." Maria snickered a bit.

"Yeah," Liz agreed uncertainly. "I... I knew, yeah. But - but we haven't talked about it, really. I didn't want to pry into something so personal between the two of you, and..."

"No, you didn't pry," Maria admitted. "And because you weren't asking, I wasn't telling, honouring your wishes. But... but you're my best friend, and best friends have the option to ask. I... I'm just a little worried about the way you've been acting ever since this started, and..."

"How have I been acting?" Liz asked sharply. Max was wondering if this wasn't the best conversation to eavesdrop on, but he could hardly help listening now - literally. Both Liz and Maria's voices were carrying, obviously neither of them giving any thought to getting overheard, and there would be no convenient way to avoid hearing. If he suddenly turned the radio up enough to drown out their voices, it would probably startle them, make them _realize_ what Max and Michael had been up to - and stifle the conversation that Max thought was one that the two friends probably needed to have, and sooner rather than later.

"I... I'm not sure how to explain it," Maria said, sighing. "I guess you seem a little distant and preoccupied. Now, I realize that there are enough reasons for you to be distant without getting into the question of if you have a sex life now, but..."

"Yeah, there are!" Liz agreed. "And... and I don't think that has anything to do with what Max and I do that's between the two of us." She sighed. "But, well, since you seem so insistent on bugging me about it..."

"It's not that I want to bug you," Maria said. "I... I was just a little worried. I - I know that it helps to talk about this kind of thing, well kinda, and - and I hoped that I'd be the person that you'd come to."

"Oh, boy," Liz muttered under her breath.

"I heard that," Maria continued. "Is... is that what it's come to? Did - did you tell someone **else**, and not me?" She let out a groan that sounded like she had stifled a cry of pure angst. "I... I can't believe this. It - it feels like our friendship is falling apart before my eyes, Liz. Was... was it Ava?"

"Yeah, okay!" Liz replied. "I... I didn't mean for it to happen like that, but - well, she came around yesterday morning [check time] to see if I needed any help packing, and my Dad had said something weird to her, and she said my face was a bit red, and all of a sudden I was telling her the whole thing."

"The... the whole thing, yesterday morning?" Maria asked. There seemed to be a moment before she put it together. "After... after the party at my Mom's house - that was you and Max's first time?" Max looked over awkwardly at Michael, who replied with a relatively friendly and understanding smile. Max hoped that Michael would be able to refrain from teasing him about anything that came out during this. "I... I see."

"I - I don't want our friendship to suffer," Liz said, sighing. "The - the fact is, I do feel closer to Ava now than - than I used to, and I guess there is no way to keep that from affecting our dynamic. Maybe... maybe sometime soon I'll wake up and realize that she's my best friend, even though I never wanted anyone else but you to have that place in my heart." Liz sighed. "But... but I didn't want to upset you or anything, and so I'd like to apologize for the way things have gone."

"Apology accepted." Maria took in a deep breath. "And... and I guess I should probably tell you this. After... after me and Michael, and once he was back in town, I - I dropped a few hints around you, and you didn't seem to want to talk about it, and I really needed someone to... just to yatter at, to get some stuff straight in my own head." She took a deep breath. "So - so I went to Isabel."

Liz made a soft giggling sound. "Really, and that helped?"

"Yeah, actually it did," Maria agreed. "I - I realize that it's a bit funny, because back when I first met Isabel I never really thought that she'd ever warm up to me. But... but thinking that we lost Alex was a bonding experience for all of us I guess, and - well, finally getting him back mellowed her even more."

"Yeah."

"But Isabel could never replace you, Liz," Maria insisted.

"Well, Ava c- erm." Liz blew a bit of air out between her teeth in a frustrated mannerism. (Max couldn't see her, but he knew Liz well enough that that didn't really matter anymore.) "I... I'm sorry that I made you feel as if you couldn't come to me and talk to something that was important, Maria. You... you said that best friends have the option to ask. Best friends also have the option to tell, and - and just because I wasn't exercising my option to ask you about something private, that - I, I didn't mean to give you the impression that I'd be uncomfortable with you telling me about something important."

"Huh... okay, got it. Thank you, sweetie."

"Any time. It's what I'm here for." Liz raised her voice slightly. "What do you guys think?"

"Umm... I think that we're busted?" Michael admitted.

Max sighed.

#

"Okay, umm, this looks like a good place to stop for a base camp," Max said, pulling into the campgrounds. "Whatcha think?"

"Umm... yeah, sure," Maria replied, though she still sounded jumpy at the idea of stopping for any significant length of time. Max just didn't think that they had any choice, himself. They couldn't keep up this pace forever, and an opportunity for nearly the entire group to sleep might help them get more ground covered in the future. And then - and then there was the Lonnie issue. Max wasn't really any more comfortable with Michael about the idea of waiting for Lonnie - but they'd voted to let her in, and that seemed to involve at least a good faith attempt to rendezvous here, not just checking once as they drove by.

The motor home pulled up in the same lot as the van, neither too close nor terribly far away, and everybody got outside for a confab. "Okay, umm, some people have to go into town to meet with - I mean, to look for Lonnie, and... and we can probably pick up a bit of camping gear - a tent for some people to sleep in, if she isn't there. Maybe even if she is," Liz decided.

"I'm in for that," Alex decided. Quickly Isabel, Michael, and Liz volunteered as well, and that seemed to fit - they headed off in the van. A lot of the other people headed off to crash, or at least rest, in every available part of the motor home - the sleeping chamber, the alcove, the sofa in the back of the living room, and even the captain seats in the cab. Max ended up alone outside with Laurie.

"Umm, I guess we're on watch, until the others get back, at least," he said, a little awkwardly.

"Yeah. Worse things... at least this way I feel like I'm contributing, though I could hardly do that much to help if some alien does show up," Laurie muttered in an undertone. "Well, run away from them and scream."

"Hey, if you scream loud enough to get Rath and Ava out here, that's about as much as anyone could ask for," Max said, and she laughed nervously. "So, umm..."

"Well, if we're going to talk, I - um, I might as well ask about you," Laurie decided. "Still don't know that much about you, Max Evans. Michael - well, he gave me a few basic stats, but still..."

"Umm, well, then ask away," Max said, smiling. "What do you wanna know?"

"I - I'm not sure where to start," Laurie admitted. "When... when did you and Michael first meet?"

Max smiled. "Well, Isabel met him first, if you're not counting that night that we came out of the pods together..."

"Oh, no, I'm counting that!" Laurie interrupted. "Tell me... about that, I mean, if it's okay to talk about."

"Hmm..." Max thought about it. "Well, let's see. I still have very few memories of leaving the pod chamber at that time, and I don't one hundred percent trust them because of the way we only remembered anything once Tess wanted us too. But most of the images seem to make sense... pulling something kinduv stretchy and flexible apart, pulling myself through and gasping to take a breath of air. Looking around a strange room full of soft blue light, seeing two - two other little people like myself, and a girl in a fourth pod who was still sleeping peacefully. Somehow a door opened in the room and we three came out exploring, finding ourselves high on a rocky peak over the desert. We got separated wandering through the desert, and then Isabel and I found each other again. And then Michael..."

"He climbed up on a rock and expected you guys to come to him," Laurie filled in. "Yeah, I remember now - Maria told me that part." Interesting, Max thought to himself. Had Michael told Maria about it, or had Liz passed on the version of the story that Max had told to her? "And you held out your hand for him when your parents came - I mean, the people who would become your parents... but he was scared and ran away."

"Yeah," Max said. "That's the meaty part of that story. And then... well, Isabel - she always remembered the other boy in the desert, even when I got to the point where I wondered if we'd imagined him. Sometimes she got really sad thinking about him. And that day, after lunch - I'd have been eating lunch with her, except that I had math club and we ate bag lunches in a classroom every Tuesday. She came into homeroom that afternoon and came up to me, and said 'I found him. I found our other brother.' I was... I was completely stunned - but she introduced Michael and I to each other at recess, and - and there wasn't any room for doubt. I... I didn't pretend to understand what was going on like Isabel did, but I knew that Michael would be my best friend for ever. Though we've had our arguments... I think I was still right about that."

Laurie smiled. "So, what can you tell me about you and your Grandpa?" Max asked. "He... he seems to have been the only family you really loved, which is kind of sad."

"Ohh... I wouldn't say that," Laurie put in. "I... I loved my mom a lot, until she - umm, she died when I was eight, from - well, they say that she had a... something wrong with her lung, or her liver, or something. It doesn't really matter, because I think that it wasn't a natural death." She sighed. "Bobby and Meredith - they were already jealous of me, because Grandpa doted on me, and - and Mom was going to have another baby, a son. I think... I think they were worried that they'd have even less chance if he had a cute little grandson, so - so they gave my Mom something to make sure... to make sure that the baby wouldn't survive - and that there wouldn't be any more." Laurie sighed. "Dad had always been cold and a little distant, and once Mom passed away, he started to get paranoid, even suspecting me of plotting against him." Laurie sighed. "I... I was fond of Dad, even when I hated him the most - it's weird how that kind of thing can happen. But..." She sighed. "But I didn't answer your question. Yeah, Grandpa was great - even when he was acting kinda crazy, there was something so endearing about his enthusiasm. And - and after my mom died, he made sure to take care of me as best he could, so that... so that I never felt anything but happy and loved, even in that house with the three of his kids in it." Laurie sighed. "It was... was only after he died that Bobby and Meredith were able to drive me crazy too, and shut me away."

"What... what about your Dad?" Max asked. "I mean... sorry if I keep asking you about things that you don't want to talk about."

"No - it's okay," Laurie said. "Well, what happened to him is hardly okay, but you know what I mean. On his forty-fifth birthday, he was found in the local hooker motel, buck naked in the bed, and with a knife wound in his chest."

"Ouch," Max muttered. "Sheesh. Do you think that your aunt and uncle put somebody up to that one too, or...?"

"I honestly don't know," Laurie added. "It could have been somebody my Dad owed money to, or... right now I'd rather just not think about it."

"Sure," Max insisted. "So... like any particular kind of music?"

Laurie laughed, and her face brightened up like something glowy.

#

"It... it feels a bit weird not to be inside the vehicle, not to be on the move," Liz said sleepily as she snuggled into Max's arms. They had settled in by this point - no sign of Lonnie at the diner where Rath and Ava said that she'd be most likely to meet them. So they would stay here all night, rest as much as they could, with a few people standing watch, both guarding against direct threats, and listening to the radio for any news that Kivar was moving back in their direction. Max had insisted that with or without Lonnie, they had to be back on the road by ten in the morning the next day, if not any sooner.

"Yeah, it is," Max admitted. They were sleeping, (or about to,) in a small two-person tent, and more specifically in a sleeping back that was inside the tent, on a foam mattress. Despite the fact that there was at least as much privacy here as in the best part of the motor home, Max didn't really feel any particular urge to indulge carnal desire with Liz right now - they were both too tired, and hearing the argument that Maria and Liz had had about keeping sex secrets from each other had affected him in an odd way that he couldn't entirely pin down yet. Maybe there'd be occasion for a bit of furtive nookie in the morning. "Goodnight, my darling," Max whispered, stroking Liz's hair, and fell quickly asleep leaning into her small body. Liz was snoring quite soon herself.

Max dreamed that he was walking across the desert sands, and after a few paces, he looked down, to check that he was himself. 'Oh, good,' he mumbled to himself, shaking his head slightly. "At least... at least I'm me in this dream, instead of reliving somebody else's memories." He did wonder what he was doing out in the desert, but not with any particular urgency, just mulling over the question idly and shrugging to himself as he plodded along.

It didn't take long for something different to happen, though. As Max walked he realized that the desert's unbroken sand was changing - at first, it was just a variation in the scenery far ahead of him - a lake or other body of water, far off in the distance, and the pleasant rise of a grass-covered hill far above the dunes. He looked more closely at it, confused, and then realized that the scenery all around him had suddenly changed - well, not the sand that he was walking on, but that seemed to be the only thing that was the same, because it was suddenly in a very different setting. Instead of making up a desert plain, the sand was... was a narrow strip of beach between a small and very pretty lake and a green hillside. This - this was what he had seen from a long way away in the desert, and now it was surrounding him totally and the desert was nowhere to be seen, not even anywhere in the distance.

What **could** be seen, though, was two other people on the beach, not far, maybe twenty-five feet or so away from Max. A couple, definitely, a young man and a beautiful woman who were in the midst of very intensive foreplay and - and he recognized them. "Oh, _gross_!" The words burst out of Max's mouth without any forethought as he started to clue in entirely on what was going on... the girl was Isabel, the guy was Alex, and she was just in the middle of pulling his bathing suit down around his ankles. "I - I didn't need to see that."

Alex and Isabel looked up, a flush of color filling his cheeks, while Isabel immediately reacted with annoyance. "Dammit, Max, what the heck are you doing here?" She straightened up slightly to berate him, and Max turned away automatically at the sight of her uncovered breasts. (At least her string bikini bottom was still in place, for whatever comfort _that_ was worth.) "No matter what, you just have to come around and ruin my fun, don't you?"

"I'm just dreaming here." It had been something Max only meant to say as a soft mantra under his breath, but apparently he must have said it loud enough for the others to hear.

"_You're_ dreaming?" Isabel shrieked. "What the hell? Did... did my dream-walking powers go flooey again and pull you in here? Or... no - you couldn't have dream-walked _me_, could you?"

"I... I don't know what's going on, assuming that you guys are real dreamers too and not just parts of my own dream," Max said, trying to shuffle slightly closer without directly looking at Isabel. He decided to treat the two of them at face value, since there was probably no way inside the dreamscape to be completely sure of their origin aside from observing their behaviour, and he'd probably get a better chance to do that without insisting that they were just figments of his imagination. Once he woke up, they'd be able to compare notes and sort out the issue more thoroughly. "Umm... actually, I guess maybe it makes the most sense for me to just wake up right now and get out of your hair." Max tried pinching himself, but though the pain was startling, it didn't affect the beach landscape a bit.

"Oh, dammit, what is it now?" Isabel asked. Max risked a cautious look, and there was good news and bad news. The good news was that Isabel had retrieved a bathing suit top, was holding it in place over her chest, and trying to fasten it together in the back. The bad news had to do with what she was staring at that had taken up most of her attention, out over the edge of the water - a darkly sinister figure, standing on a small floating - kind of a hover-Segway. Max found the image funny for a split second, but that was before the passenger raised its hand and shot a blue-purple fireball at the three of them. Max managed to bring up an energy shield, but the concussion of the enemy's attack seemed to rattle his bones through his connection to the force field.

"Dammit, we need cover," Alex muttered. "Is that just a manifestation of someone's nervousness about Kivar, or..."

Isabel interrupted him - apparently her bosom was mostly secured now. "I - I saw some trees up on the hillside, over a way," she muttered. "Might help, assuming that he can't just set fire to the whole woods. Do we try?"

"We try **something,** Max muttered."But keep an eye out for anything more fireproof." As one, they turned and ran away from the water, dodging laser beams as well as possible. (Max noticed idly that Alex's swimsuit had also been replaced, which he was definitely glad of, though he hadn't noticed just when it happened.) A burst of violently hot light caught him on the forearm, just a few inches back from the wrist - a painful burn, and one that Max hoped wouldn't keep him from channelling energy through his left hand or anything. As they rushed towards the forest, Alex pointed out something that looked possibly more promising - a kind of cave entrance, which led into a rocky tunnel. Max still wasn't sure about this - a tunnel might mean that they could get trapped in a dead end, but Isabel and Alex were already running blindly for cover, so he followed him. Quickly the darkness of the under-earth swallowed them up, and there was silence except for the three teens running through the dark - and a dark, slightly menacing laughter from the vicinity of the cave entrance.

"What... what's going on here?" Max hissed as he felt himself getting closer to Isabel - and then he stumbled over something, landing in an awkward crouch. "Has... has Kivar actually attacked this dreamscape? Is that why we can't get out? Or..."

"I - I don't know," Isabel's voice came back, on the edge of panic. "I don't have any of the answers for you, Max. I... I really don't know. Nothing quite like this has ever happened to me before." She sighed. "I just wanted to fool around with Alex for a while without having to deal with the backseat of the van..."

"Shh," Max said, even though he hated to interrupt her. An odd sensation of motion and faint sound happened in the darkness next to him, which was probably the result of Alex wrapping Isabel into a pair of comforting arms. But there was the sound of footsteps coming into the tunnel, and then a glowing hand with six fingers lit up the area - illuminating the masked figure of Kivar, (looking a bit like Darth Vader when the light came from underneath him,) and showing that the three of them were backed up against a pit drop of terrifyingly uncertain depth. Somehow, even from behind that mask, in the dream Max could feel Kivar's gaze sweeping dismissively over Alex, of considering him for a long amused moment, and then moving on to Isabel - with surprise.

"Arynda," the dark figure breathed, surprised and just slightly upset. And suddenly Max woke up gasping and stifling a shriek, with his arms still around Liz. Liz woke too, worried about whatever was upsetting him. Without saying a word, Max got up, grabbed a jacket to use as an impromptu dressing gown, and hurried out of the tent to go over to the van. Max had seen Alex stretched out over the back seat, and Isabel curled up comfortably on the middle seat, before he and Liz had retired to the tent. Now both of them, too, were awake and agitated. Max decided that if he'd stayed in the tent, they might well have sought him out themselves.

It didn't take too long to establish that the three of them had experienced the same dream images, or for Liz and Michael (who was on watch,) to get the gist of things as Max and Isabel compared notes. What the meaning of the dream was was much harder to tell.

"I... I have a theory," Liz said slowly, and everybody turned to her. Kivar... Kivar was somehow able to sense your dream walking powers in operation and home in on them, Isabel. Along the way - maybe breaking into your dream pulled Max in as a side effect, or maybe Kivar could recognize Max's sleeping thoughts and wanted him to be there." She sighed deeply. "I'm... I'm not sure what his objectives were, if they were just information gathering or if he would have tried to hurt any of you through your dreams. But... but he was exerting power to keep any of you from waking up, from the time that Max got in there. All the way up to the end, he was exerting more and more concentration in that, until suddenly - you said he looked at you, Isabel, and was startled by something, right?" Isabel nodded. "Okay, so when he was startled, that ruined his concentration, and it only took a moment for all of you to escape the dream."

"If it really was from Kivar, does that mean that he'll have a better lock on us now?" Michael muttered, worried. Nobody had an answer.

"Okay, we need to leave Columbus soon," Max muttered. "It's..." He leaned over and took a look at the digital clock on the van's dash stereo. "Holy heck, it's nearly half past four AM?"

"Umm... yeah," Isabel agreed. "I, umm, I woke up after four twenty and brought out Alex's picture. The dream-walk itself didn't take very long."

"Ahh..." Max said, considering. Obviously he had slept a long time himself, maybe having other dreams that he couldn't remember, before getting swept up into the shared dream. "Okay, well... we can check the diner for Lonnie among the breakfast crowd in around half an hour then. I..." He sighed. "Vote or no vote, I **don't** want to be hanging around Columbus for long now."

"What - what was it that Kivar called you, Isabel?" Michael asked, and Alex repeated the word: 'Arynda.'

"I... I don't know if that's a name or what," Isabel said. "If it is - what does it mean? Is that something that connects to Vilandra, or..."

"Or, if Tess wasn't the bride, maybe you weren't the traitor," Alex said. "Maybe you're someone else that Kivar recognizes from Antar." Isabel's eyes widened in shock, not quite sure how to come to terms with that idea. "In fact, well come to think of it - if there's reorganization in the roles from what you expected, then - then maybe Tess is..." He couldn't finish the thought.

But Liz did. "Maybe Tess is the traitor," she agreed. "Vilandra. I... I was wondering about that earlier, way back after you talked to Rayde back in Roswell, but - well, but I didn't want to bring it up. Not like Tess didn't behave like Vilandra - or like Lonnie, for that matter. She sold everybody out for dubious and risky gain to herself. In fact, I'm not sure that even Lonnie has been as Vilandra-ish as Tess was." She sighed. "The creepy thing is..."

"Don't - don't even say it for now," Max warned her. All kinds of uncomfortable ideas - that of Tess being his spirit sister instead of his destined mate - of what it would mean, then, that she'd... no, he couldn't even come to terms with those thoughts yet, never mind words.

"Alright," Isabel said. "But... but if any of that's true, does that mean that I'M..."

"There's no evidence that way," Liz quickly jumped in. "In fact, it doesn't fit with at the clue we just got - if you'd been the bride, then Kivar would have called you Ava or some variant on that. No, that's not the answer to that part of the puzzle." Isabel and Max both breathed a quick sigh of relief.

"Well, I don't think any of us are going to be getting any more sleep," Alex pointed out. "Michael, you wanna see if you can catch some z's? I'll take over watch."

"Alright," Michael said. "Probably no-one else should sleep in the tent now - not if we may need to get moving in a hurry."

"I'll pack it up and take it down," Liz said, and then kissed Max quietly. "Say hi to Lonnie for me - something tells me that when you go to the diner looking, she's gonna be there."

Max shot a look over Isabel, very unimpressed with that idea now - but they were committed to look. Michael disappeared into the back of the motor home, and Max sat with Alex in the van, listening for news, but things seemed quiet on the Kivar front at this point. He sighed, wondering how long it would take the dreadful warlord to act - to correct the mistake he had made by going the wrong way.

#

"Okay, let's do this, I guess," Ava said, looking over first at Rath, and then to Max beyond him. They were well outside the diner, but it wasn't hard to tell that Liz's hunch was starting to come true. A distinctive red Porsche was parked out in the corner of the lot, making a conspicuous departure from the other kinds of cars that this establishment's patrons generally drove. There was also a semi-familiar looking figure visible in one of the windows. Max turned around to take a look at Liz, sitting behind the driver's wheel of the van as their getaway girl, (though nobody was quite sure in what circumstances they might need one,) and headed towards the front doors.

Lonnie had spotted them and waved by the time they were most of the way to the diner proper, and the mood was oddly relaxed and loose as they greeted each other at her table. "So, I guess you figured that I figured this might be a good place to hook up?" she said softly, her brownish eyes aimed directly at Rath.

"Yeah, umm, something like that." Rath admitted. "So - what do you expect happens next, Lonn?"

"I want to leave with you guys," she said firmly. "I realize that the ground rules are different now, and I want to be back with you. Think I can pay my fare in several different ways - I still have talents and sources of information that none of the rest of you have got."

"Speaking of information," Max put in, "does the name Arynda mean something to you, Lonnie?" Lonnie blanched slightly, and nodded.

"Yeah, but I might need to think for a bit to place it," she admitted. "And of course, even if I knew off the top of my head, I'm not sure I'd be saying anything before we came to an understanding-"

"You want to be back with me?" Rath repeated Lonnie's words from back a few steps in the exchange of dialog, and Max realized that Rath had been stunned by the statement. "That - that's what you meant, right? Not being with us generally, one of the group, but with..." Lonnie looked at him, and Rath swallowed. "I... I don't think so, babe. For - for one thing, I'm spoken for otherwise now."

Lonnie's eyes widened slightly. "You... you found someone else? Who?" She racked her brains. "Did that Maria chick decide to trade her Spaceboy in for a slightly cooler and more punk-a-licious model? Or... or maybe you managed to sweep Isabel off her feet? Hmm, either way, there'd be some hunky guy left out in the cold, but I'm not sure I wanna help myself to the leftovers..."

"No," Ava announced. "Rath's with **me** now. Which means no leftovers - since the only other guy in my heart was Zan." Lonnie shook her head in frustration.

"Is... is arranging a consort for you really part of this deal, Lonnie?" Max asked pointedly. "You... you want protection and the safety of numbers. We probably have uses for the alien knowledge and abilities that you've picked up." He sighed. "I think that we can deal - but I expect nothing but complete honour from you. If you can't reach that standard... well, it might be better that we head off in our separate ways."

Lonnie looked over at Max, focusing her attention entirely on him for the first time since they'd arrived at the diner. He looked back at her, and couldn't help but make a mental inventory of Isabel's identical worser half. Like Rath and Ava, Lonnie had apparently drifted closer to her opposite number in appearance over the summer - her hair was a bit wavier and a darker blond than Isabel's, with two locks running down the side of her face in a style that Max found slightly odd, but also would probably help to make sure that he didn't mistake them. She was wearing a dark purple spandex shirt, and only had one piercing beyond the usual ones on her earlobes that Max could see - a very small stud through the side of her nose. "Okay," she said finally. "I... I'll be on my best behaviour, and I really do think that'll be enough." She sighed. "I got the gist of what happened with Tess, and - well, even though arguably she got off light considering what all she did - I don't want any of you to get that pissed at me."

"And this isn't just about the big stuff," Max continued, pushing Lonnie to see at which point she'd push back. "Not selling us all out at once is a no brainer. But I expect you to treat my friends decently, according to human standards - not taking what isn't yours, or playing mind games to get your own way."

"Yeah, yeah, I get it," Lonnie argued, frustrated. "Now, can we get going? I... I've been feeling something upsetting hovering around this whole area for the past hour or so. Sooner we get on the road, the better."

"Well, I'm gonna go up and make a takeout order," Rath decided, standing up. "Then we can drive back to the campground and... no, that doesn't make sense. Evans, call and tell the others to break camp. We'll worry about making a rendezvous later."

Max nodded, picked up his cell phone, and called over to Alex, explaining what had had been agreed with Lonnie briefly and suggesting the obvious things. Meanwhile, Ava started bringing Lonnie up to speed slightly on the details of what was going on.

Once Rath was heading back with the food, Lonnie stood up from the table for the first time, and Max saw that she was wearing an odd kind of long leather skirt, tight enough that he was surprised she could walk so fast, with long slits up the sides, but the slits were fastened together with laces running back and forth. "So, Kyle's the only odd man out, right?" she asked Ava. "Cute, lean and fit body - he was always giving Tess the eye when he thought she wasn't looking the first time we came to Roswell?" Ava nodded. "Hmm... has potential."

Max shook his head and wondered if Kyle would even realize what hit him when Lonnie got her chance to make a fresh impression on him. It definitely seemed that Lonnie was in the mood for company, and if Rath wasn't going to give her a chance, she'd try her luck elsewhere.

"Great," Liz muttered when she realized the situation, aided by a few whispered hints from Max. "Another tricky situation to keep an eye on, in the midst of all this alien madness."

And they took off for Pittsburgh as fast as traffic on the highway would allow.

#

"Okay, that's the situation," Rath said. He'd filled Lonnie in on just about every important thing that had happened over the course of their flight this far. "Got any insights?"

"Hmm." Lonnie considered. "Well, I always suspected that there'd been some more shape shifters hanging around Earth for the past few decades - and at least one of them being a sister." She chuckled. "No specific details like this couple from Louisville, or what happened to their kid, but Jenni Madison might well have been able to see the same flash that you got from her, Maxxie boy, and even without that she just might be able to guess that you'd find out about the art museum, or think that you'd already known about it when you went to visit her." She sighed. "'Shana' will expect you to show up there, and plan accordingly."

"So... so she _will_ meet us there?" Liz asked.

"I - I didn't say that," Lonnie protested. "It all depends on what she's after. If she wants to meet you, to attack or to make friends, then yeah, I think she'll show up. If she's not ready to expose herself yet, then she'll either just stay well away plan some other kind of surprise - which might be friendly or unfriendly, depending on her disposition. And, once again, you have to make the decision about whether you're going to walk into whatever will happen, or stay away."

"I... I'm worried, but not enough to steer clear," Ava replied. "Whatever this thing is with Shana, it's important... maybe even the key to our survival. There was a reason that Liz and Isabel and the guys heard that story down in Dallas."

"So you think that she's friendly?" Rath asked. "Or, that maybe she's the most dangerous threat to us, even counting Kivar, and we can't afford to ignore her?" Ava shrugged.

"What about Arynda?" Liz asked. Nobody spoke up. "Umm, Lonnie?"

"Oh, right, Parker." Lonnie blew air through her plush lips dismissively and sighed. "I... I'm still not sure entirely, but - but I think it has some connection to - to the Royal Four. She wasn't one of the foursome herself, but - but someone who was nearby when they were growing up." Lonnie's face creased in thought. "A serving girl? Somebody's bratty little sister? The daughter of someone who worked in the castle?" She shook her head. "It's not coming clear."

"Hmm." Max considered that. "Speaking of, just for the record, do you really remember anything about the Royal Four growing up? I mean, there are some awkward gaps in what we know. Vilandra and Zan were brother and sister, the children of the old king and Queen Alinda... and Zan was presumably the oldest son, or oldest surviving son, at least. Zan married Ava, and Vilandra was betrothed to Rath, although she was apparently stepping out on him with Kivar, near the end." He groaned softly. "But... but most of that is just the end of the movie. Were there other kids in the Royal family? Where did Ava and Rath come from?"

"I... I don't know that much, for sure," Lonnie admitted with a groan. "Especially because I've realized lately that lots of what I thought I remembered were either getting made up on a subconscious level, or stuff that Nicholas or other people were putting into my head. I... I'm pretty sure that Ava was..."

"Dammit!" Rath suddenly swore. "Nicholas. I knew that we forgot about somebody important, but I couldn't put my finger on who." Several people turned to stare at Rath, including Max. Liz didn't, because she was still driving. "Well, think about it - he's Kivar's lackey here on Earth, and he knows most of us pretty well. Maybe he'll be able to help Kivar's troops find us."

"Just what **did** happen between you guys and Nicholas, before the Summit?" Liz asked. "It might help us figure out what our next move is."

"Basically, he tracked the Emissaries when they came to Earth to find the Royal Four, and talked me up with all kinds of stories about how wonderful it'd be to be going back home," Lonnie grumped. "That's pretty much why Rath and I... did what we did to Zan, when he decided that he didn't want to attend the Summit. Which was probably what he wanted. _and_ he let slip about you guys very carefully."

"Right. Well, think about it, though," Ava said. "Nicholas has had a fairly dismal record here on Earth when it comes down to his true mission. He never got his mitts on the Granilith, he wasn't able to off or capture any of us except maybe, indirectly, Zan - and Max has been more than enough of a pain in Kivar's butt to overshadow that. He wasn't able to accomplish _anything_ at the summit, and made himself and Kivar look a little foolish trying. He lost an entire crowd of Skin agents when Tess blew her top on him. Also, Nicholas is kinda cowardly, and Kivar's supposed to be pretty mean and impatient. Maybe Nicholas is just hiding from the big man."

"I... I hope so," Max said. "Speaking of which - that thing with the Copper summit skins, and the firewall trick that Tess used - do you think that most of the Sins really **did** die in that? As opposed to the whole thing just being a fake-out, a cover so that Tess, and I, could get out of that situation alive and Tess could carry on with the plan of seducing me and Judas-ing us all?"

"I, I do think that most of them bit it," Ava agreed after a long moment. "Most of the skins weren't in the know about the deeper plan - even Nicholas may not have had 'Need to Know' at that point. And I don't think that even her powers were strong enough to spare _everybody_ and have you not realize it. She probably intentionally let Nicholas go, because Kivar would have busted her ass for killing him - and Nicholas would still have had to use a mind-warp to cover himself, and probably a shield to ward away the backwash of the rest of the flames. But that was small enough that it could slip under your radar. The entire Copper Summit Skin complement trying to pull that trick would mostly never have flown."

"Okay, yeah, I see what you mean," Max admitted. And then he yawned a big yawn. "I can't think of this any more. Anyone else wanna come up and navigate, while I take a nap?"

"I'll go," Lonnie volunteered. "If you trust me with it, that is."

"Go," Ava said. Once they had changed places, Max thought that he saw Ava watching Lonnie intently, as if aware for the possibility that Lonnie might do something unexpected.


	9. Chapter 9: Please be quiet

"Hello there Lonnie," Amy said as they climbed into the motor home. The landscape around the highway was incredibly different from the New Mexico desert that they had started in - not too surprising considering how far north and east they'd come, Max thought, and wondered just how far it was to the Pennsylvania border. He could still tell exactly what co-ordinates they were if he wanted to check the GPS, but he didn't know the location of the state line offhand, this far from home. "I don't believe we've had the pleasure before."

Lonnie raised her eyebrows slightly at Maria's mother, as if she were quite surprised that anyone would describe meeting her as a pleasure. (Maybe she wasn't the only one - considering her reputation.) "Can I offer you some slightly stale crullers or a can of cola?" Jim muttered, prodded into saying something by a discreet elbow from Amy.

"Coffee, if you've got any," Lonnie said decisively, her eyes sweeping around the living space. Nobody seemed to be hidden away and sleeping - Laurie had gone over to the van to keep Rath, Ava, and Liz company - now that was a meeting that Max wouldn't mind dream-wallflying, if he got a chance to - since Laurie usually seemed so nervous if she was seperated from Michael and Maria, and Rath was generally pretty formidable. But Laurie had volunteered for the switch - maybe she had wanted to get to know her 'other brother' a bit better - or her other surrogate grandfather, or whatever.

Michael and Maria were up in the motor home's cab, which left Isabel. Alex, and Kyle, as well as Jim, and Amy, which crowded the living space available slightly. As if sensing the crunch, Isabel took Alex's hand, led him past Max, who was still standing close to the door as the vehicle started moving, and the two of them climbed up into the sleeping alcove, arranging themselves after a moment with their heads poking out so that they could still participate in any conversation. "Umm, hey, let me get your stuff," Jim said suddenly, pointing at the suitcase in Lonnie's hands. He hadn't really been paying attention when she brought it to the van from the diner, but it made sense that even in a situation like this, any girl who shared DNA with Isabel wouldn't be travelling so light as to have only the clothes on her back.

"Um, thanks," Lonnie replied, handing the bag over. "Just, umm, don't stick it in the back or anything stupid like that. I may need to get something in a little bit." She looked around, seeming to still take a moment acclimating to the change of situation, though Max wasn't sure he believed that. Lonnie was too much of a player to take long to adapt to anything so simple as a motor home. Maybe she was just playing dumb, trying to catch somebody off guard.

Or maybe the friendliness with which a strange woman was treating her had really surprised her, he had to admit. Mrs DeLuca had that affect on people sometimes. Max wondered if Amy had been one of the secret votes to allow Lonnie in. Then again, Max had voted 'Yea' himself, deviled into it by a guilty conscience. He wasn't any big fan of Lonnie, but the thought of Kivar catching her and doing something horrible to her... she had his sister's face, and so some level of affection and guilt seemed to transfer over. Oh, and then, there was the faint notion that it might be better to keep trouble where he could see it, as opposed to somewhere else.

"Well, we don't need to stick it into the cargo compartment I guess," Mister Valenti said, putting Lonnie's case down, halfway behind the couch in the back. "Of course, it'd definitely be stupid to go to a lot of trouble just to stick it behind other people's things." Amy was pressing a cup of reheated coffee into Lonnie's hand, and Lonnie had locked her gaze to the couch. Specifically, to a young man sitting at the back corner of the couch.

"It's Kyle, right?" she said, sitting down next to him and... and Max couldn't tell exactly what else Lonnie was doing, except the way she was sitting made her look a little strange - but then, he was nearly behind her. Max sidled up the wall and then things started to fall a little better into place - the way Kyle looked up, then his eyes backtracked down a little bit and bugged out was a clear clue. "We met back in the UFO Museum, in Roswell, though I'm not sure we actually spoke to each other back then."

"Umm, no, I wasn't invited to that m-meet," Kyle said, tearing his eyes away from Lonnie's shirt with difficulty. "Not that I really minded. Wasn't wild about the alien craziness at the time, and - erm, well, some of the reviews from that particular event weren't wild." Lonnie turned around, trying to catch the attention of someone who'd been there, and since Alex and Isabel were way up behind her, all she found was Max.

"Umm... yeah. I had a **blast**," he said, putting a bit of sarcasm into his voice, "but Michael and Maria weren't so wild about it. Isabel too, I guess."

"Well, I dunno what it is," Lonnie muttered, "because I'm **sure** that I remember having the pleasure..." She got it then, but not quite in time to keep Kyle from beating her to it.

"Portland, June," he drawled. "When Rath tracked you down, to get you to take a message to Isabel and Michael. Let them know that Alex was okay, except that we were kinduv too late and you couldn't talk with them while they were on their way back."

"Right, that," Lonnie sighed. "Was that really the first time we met? I keep thinking that there was something else..."

"I don't think so," Kyle said, groaning a little like he was getting tired of the conversation.

"Ohh," Lonnie said suddenly. "Oh, right." But she didn't elaborate, and there was a silent moment before Amy hurried over and joined them at the coffee table.

"So, umm, how about playing a game or something to pass the time?" she said. "Umm, we've got a few board sets here, and a deck of cards..."

"Well, we could try extreme diplomacy," Lonnie said, cocking her head slightly. "But... hrm, that really takes two decks of cards to play properly, especially if..." she trailed off into thought for a moment. "How many are going to play?"

"Well, how about five?" Valenti asked, walking over with a little box in his hands, identical to the one that Amy had already produced. "That is, if you're in, Max, and everyone else already at the table."

"Cool." Lonnie grinned with a slightly cocky pleasure. "Alright, we'll need a big piece of paper for keeping score too, because things can get a bit complicated." The five of them arranged around the table, and Jim started shuffling all the cards together, which didn't really work because there were so many, so he and Kyle started shuffling halves and switching chunks of cards every so often. Isabel and Alex were just watching intently from up above as Lonnie found a sheet of computer paper and started drawing up a complicated scoring chart on it.

"Now, the point is to come up on top through negotiations with the other players," Lonnie started. "The cards that you'e dealt represent your millitary assets, but you don't really want to call in the army unless there's no other choice, because everybody who's in a millitary showdown loses the assets they commit to it, and even the winner scarcely makes enough points to be worth it, most times. Um, are the jokers in there?"

"Yeah, four jokers total," Kyle replied, and chuckled nervously when Lonnie smiled at him.

"Okay. deal out fifteen cards to each of us," Lonnie directed him.

They played most of the way to Pittsburgh, with Jim switching out for Alex halfway through, because Maria wanted a break from navigating. Max was finding the interplay of personalities and possibilities, co-operation and cutthroat frankly fascinating, enough so that he even stopped missing Liz's company after a while. (Though he'd never admit that to her.) The 'showdowns' where each player picked out a five-card poker hand to 'fight' against other players to settle an issue that could not be negotiated, were very exciting, but as Lonnie had said, it was better to avoid them if you possibly could. This was a new insight into Lonnie's character for Max - he wouldn't have thought that she was the sort who'd be comfortable with the notion of working together being better than fighting.

Then again, that was kind of why she'd come to meet them in the first place. And, it was important to bear in mind, that this particular version of 'working together' that Lonnie was practicing in the game included cultivating different allies seperately, working hard to make sure that she got more out of the team effort than her partners, setting her teammates at each others throats to their detriment, and a fierce determination to come out on top. Did she have similar ambitions for the road trip?

And when the small convoy of two vehicles was pulling into the suburbs of Pittsburgh, it was quite clear that Lonnie was indeed on top - her greater familiarity with the rules of the game had given her an advantage from the start, of course, so that her victory had probably been a forgone conclusion. But most of the players seemed to have had a pretty good time nonetheless. When he hadn't been focusing on the scoreboard or the tactical possibiliteis of his hand of cards, Max had been watching the interplay between Lonnie and Kyle, alternately amused and nervous.

Some of the signs of what was going on between them were starting to come clear to him. Lonnie had already mentioned, back in the diner, that she was interested in male companionship at this point, and probably it hadn't taken her long to work out that Kyle was her only unattached target. (She probably couldn't have found out yet about the letter from Tess, and Kyle hadn't given anything away to anyone how he felt about that yet, to the best of Max's knowledge.) She was strikingly beautiful and magnetically confident, and beginning a campaign of seduction with a degree of subtlety that Max, again, hadn't realized she was capable of.

As far as Kyle - well, he was interested, Max thought, though it was hard to tell how much. Max suspected that Kyle had been definitely in lust with Isabel, though not wanting to get involved with her - especially before Tess came to town. Was he just looking forward to flirting back with Lonnie, or in the mood for more? It was hard to tell, especially since opportunities for 'more' were relatively scarce under these sort of circumstances. Max knew that much only too well.

"Okay, who's coming to the museum?" Amy asked. "Everybody?"

"I'd say no," Isabel remarked. "It could be dangerous, and, well... some of the people who are less able to protect themselves should be kept safe."

"I disagree," Alex said. "Shana's opportunities to really carry out a serious attack in that situation have to be limited - because it's such a public venue, if nothing else. That means that you'll be able to defend better." He sighed. "I'd say we should all go. That'll make us more conspicuous, and if she only leaves some subtle message, there'll be more chance of someone seeing it."

"Why don't some of us do shopping for supplies, like we've done elsewhere?" Jim suggested peaceably.

The discussion went on and on from there, spreading over cell phone connections to the van. Eventually it was agreed that they'd all do shopping first, followed by the trip to the museum, where everybody but Michael and Maria would go inside - the two of them being held in reserve mostly as drivers for the two vehicles, just in case that might help if a quick getaway was required.

As Maria's mom counted out a suggested contribution for everyone in their party and hushed the rowdier kids like Rath and Lonnie, Max found himself wondering how the museum's exhibits might have changed since Jennifer had attented the museum as a young girl. She wouldn't have been Jenni Madison back then - they hadn't found out her birth name, before she got married. How had she managed to take a bad fall, and without attracting too much immediate attention for Shana to be able to help? Had the fall been as accidental as it seemed, or had Shana caused the injury as well as healing it, just for the sake of having a human girl who'd feel beholden to her?

And, as a related question, had Shana been working here at the museum, attending on a whim? There was so much that they didn't get understand. Max reached out to hold Liz's hand as they walked through a few rooms of Great Depression paintings. He wanted to keep her safe, and he wasn't sure what he needed to protect her from, if anything, and how. So he tried to pretend like they were just two ordinary kids, in love and full of amorous hormones, impatient with being taken to a museum on a pretty fall day. Somehow it wasn't hard to get into that frame of mind.

He was getting so tense with waiting for something to happen, though, that he was taken off guard when it actually did. Part of the problem was that he'd been expecting either something fairly ordinary or an event that was startlingly dramatic. Maybe the security guards would come up to Liz on a pretext, or a bunch of little seven-year old kids that they'd hardly even noticed would crowd around, cutting off a retreat. Perhaps the building would suddenly catch fire, or the beautiful Shana would simply step out in front of them and announce herself. (Or the aged one, for that matter.)

What happened, at first, was that a pleasant alto voice, somewhere close by but not within Max's field of vision, asked, "Are you Max Evans?" Max turned around, expecting to answer with a guarded defensive, like 'And just who's asking?'

But there wasn't anyone behind him, of over his shoulder, or even up above his head. Liz was looking at him curiously, and Max suddenly revved up his mind, realizing that he had to fathom what had just happened, that it could be desperately serious. "You... you didn't hear anything, did you?" he asked in a low whisper to Liz. She shook her head, mystified. Max walked around in a small circle, examining the crowd more distant. None of them could have spoken to him by traditional means, but there was the possibility of a mindwarp to consider, and Max was worrying about little else. If Shana had Tess' powers, she could have made him think that he had heard a whisper when she wasn't terribly near, and made the sensation unique to Max, something that Liz couldn't have perceived.

Of course, the problem with that was that, when you started to worry about it, there was very little that a mindwarp couldn't explain. That way lurked paranoia and eventually sollipsism, the delusion that nothing at all was real. (Of course, Max had seen the Matrix movies, so he was familiar with the idea that nothing had been real to begin with, and it was pretty much impossible to be sure that _wasn't_ a delusion. But Max didn't intend to seriously entertain that idea without a very good reason to.) So he had to look closely for supporting evidence to the mindwarp theory, or at least work out whether it was consistent in itself.

Nobody seemed to be looking at him except the other members of the gang in that particular room. Max mumbled "Show yourself," in a stifled growl, but got no response, until he had nearly finished the circle. Just as his foot landed on the floor, the same voice came again, saying the same thing. "Are you Max Evans?" He couldn't resist twisting around to try and catch sight of the voice again, but there was no sign, which just confirmed the idea that it was a mental sensation. However, something was nagging at Max - it didn't seem like a mindwarp, more like - well, like something he was very familiar with, except that he couldn't quite put his finger on it.

"Max?" Liz seemed to be getting more agitated at his peculiar behavour, and Max could hardly blame her for that. Without knowing why, he backed up two steps and walked forward into the same part of the museum room's floor again - and got the same words again. The mystery was starting to dawn on him now.

Smiling, Max turned to Liz and then backed away a bit again. "Take a step and a half towards me," he suggested. Curious, Liz did - and then from the look on her face he was sure that she had experienced something.

"Someone... a chick maybe, was asking if I were you," she breathed silently. "Max... what does it mean?"

A part of Max was surprised that Liz hadn't worked it out instantly, even though it had taken him much longer - in fact, he hadn't been sure until Liz had confirmed what she'd heard. "It's... it's a kind of flash or something," he replied. "If 'flash' isn't a misnomer for an extrasensory experience that has no visual component, just a voice. Someone with alien powers has charged that spot with a sensory message. Probably only those touched with alien powers will experienced it."

"So this is the sign from Shana that we were expecting?" Liz asked, in a whisper so quiet that it was hardly even sound at all, her sleek body pressed tightly against Max's side in a way that was rather distracting, even under the circumstances.

"The... the first sign, at least. By itself, a question about who I am isn't much of a gambit. There'll be something else here in the museum - maybe other flash spots, maybe something else." But Max was smiling. They had found a reasonably direct sign from their mysterious shapeshifter, in the general location that he had predicted one, and it was... not immediately hostile. Of course, that didn't mean that Shana's intentions weren't subtly hostile... always assuming that it really was she, although that seemed like a pretty good deduction to make, or was it an induction? There could be some more delicate plan of trickery or treachery about. But this sort of thing... a concealed message, starting by asking if the recipient was who you thought it was... that was the sort of thing that Max himself would use if he had an opportunity in this sort of situation, and his stance was a guardedly friendly one. And that was the other thing about it. Whoever had left the audio flash had known his name.

"Let's tell the others," Max urged Liz, and they headed out to carry on the message. Soon, they were scouring the floor, trying to find other messages without being too obvious about it - and not letting down their guard, just in case the first flash had been a diversionary tactic meant only to put them at ease and distract their attention. Soon Ava hurried over to the two of them, and whispered in Liz's ear. Liz passed the message along to Max - Rath thought that he might have found something, but he wasn't sure.

When they met up with him, Rath was in a small, out of the way chamber filled with unusual sculptures. He was staring fixedly at an ungainly construction near the wall that looked a bit like a flattened ten foot tall robotic peacock made out of clay struts, and staring fixedly at one of the... um, a wingtip, Max decided. "I... I know that we're not supposed to touch the exhibits," he growled. "And so on the face of it it doesn't make much sense to embed a flash into one of them. And... and I couldn't tell you why I've got a feeling about this particular part of this exhibit - but I really do think that there's a message from Shana here too." He sighed. "Maybe it's a vibe that I'm getting through the air from it, or something subliminal that I'm seeing, I dunno. But I think that if I reach out and touch that strut, something will happen."

Liz kept her voice low and flat. "Rath, out of curiosity - would you describe yourself as a vibrator?" Max and Ava both choked down slightly different suddenly occuring laughs. Rath's face clouded over with suspicious anger. "I... I'm not trying to make fun of what you said - or of you, really I'm not," she insisted. "That's kind of an in-joke about Michael and Maria, back from when they were first getting to know each other. A term that both of them, umm, each of them used for the other - someone who sends out or receives 'vibrations.'" Liz smiled slightly, and Max knew that she was thinking about how funny the term had seemed to her when she'd first heard it from Maria... as Max knew it had to himself and Isabel when Michael came out with it. (Alex hadn't been around at that point yet, or at least, not close enough to get the play by play from Maria and Liz, because he hadn't known the alien secret yet.) "And to a certain extent I'd say that it's accurate for both of them, but I guess I still don't know you that well."

"Ohh." Rath sighed. "Well, I guess. Maybe." And then he let out a groan. "Should I go ahead or what?"

"Umm... okay, yeah," Max decided in a whisper. "Just, umm, let us check for any of the docents or security guards or something." This was accomplished quickly, and Rath reached out to lightly brush the surface of the gray clay, and his stance seemed to stiffen and shiver at the same time. Ava hurried over, checking, but after a few seconds Rath assured her that he was okay. They hurried out of the sculpture room and found a long bench to sit on and talk - well, Rath and the girls sat on the bench, a female to either side of him, and Max squatted down opposite Rath. This way each of them were close enough to hear without him having to raise his voice.

"I... I saw Shana, as the old woman, but it was like I was looking out of her eyes too," Rath relayed once he had taken a moment to organize the thoughts and impressions. "Like she was talking at a mirror or something, for my benefit so that I could see who she was." He sighed. "She said she was glad that both of us had thought of the museum, and that... that it was very important to keep on going northeast. That... that our lives might depend on it. And - umm, I don't really understand this part, but she said that somebody couldn't come to Roswell, or somebody was sick in Roswell... I can't remember the exact words."

"They... they might be important, Rath," Liz whispered. "If you can concent... no, on second thought, concentrating too hard is probably going to be counterproductive in a situation like this - or at least, it probably would be for me." She sighed. "Just... just don't let yourself forget about that flash entirely, okay? Anything you can remember will help out."

"Was... was that it?" Ava asked Rath. "Maybe... maybe I can touch it too, and..."

"No, I don't think this was a repeater like Max's on the floor," Rath muttered. "First come, only one served. You can try I guess, babe, but don't be disappointed." He said. "Umm... that was nearly it, except for... 'follow the line, if you haven't already.'"

"The line?" Max repeated. "Umm... like what kind of line?"

"Maybe if we draw a straight line from the spot on the floor to the part of the sculpture that Rath touched," Liz guessed, "there'll be at least one other message falling on it."

"Okay," Ava said. "Though it'll be hard to work out the straight line in this cockeyed place, especially without someone starting to ask about what we're doing." Liz nodded soberly.

There were indeed some awkward moments as the plan came into a new phase, and it took a while to find the third and last clue that they encountered that day at the museum. By now, Max was starting to get a bead on Shana's intentions, though he was trying not to take anything for granted. She'd come here and left the preparations ahead of them - he wasn't sure why this had been better than simply meeting them in person, but her demeanour seemed friendly and at least slightly helpful. Was she trying to help them escape Kivar? Why was the need for all the cloak and dagger stuff, then? Unless she was worried that she might lead Kivar's agents to them... which still didn't quite add up yet. And who had been sick in Roswell, or unable to get there? There were still far too many unanswered questions.

"Okay," Alex said, quietly stepping up to Max. Liz was off with Kyle and his father, Max wasn't quite sure what they were doing. "In the gallery of the anonymous, there's a big circular design on the floor, and the line runs right through the very center. Isabel... she's sure that there's something there, a message, but she can't get it. Maybe... maybe it's cued to play only for one particular person. Like - like maybe you, since Shana knows your name."

Max considered that. "Oh- okay, I'll give it a try." He let Max lead him through the halls and exhibit rooms of the museum, nearly to the extreme end of it, and a docent insisted on having him read the message about the gallery of the anonymous before going in. Apparently, it was like some kind of... of participatory performance art piece, or an ongoing amateur psychology experiment. You were supposed to follow a few simple rules for as long as you were in the gallery - most notably, not paying any more attention to any other person than you could possibly help, and above _all_ things not making eye contact. Max shrugged and went inside. Seemed a bit weird, but at least that would probably make it easy for them to fool around with the flash spot without attracting any attention. It wasn't hard to find the big circular design, though the gallery had a bunch of people inside and a few other things that you could look at in order to avoid looking at people. Max quickly crossed over, stepping right in the center of the smallest circle, (it kind of looked a bit like those curling targets on the canadian sports cable channel, which at least made it easy to zero in on the center, as it were.) expecting a dramatic flash. However, he also got the same sensation as Isabel had reported, that there was a message hidden at that spot, but... but that either he didn't have the key, or that he wasn't the key. "Maybe- maybe Rath," he said to Isabel and Alex without looking at them. "Since he got the second message, maybe he's the one."

Isabel went out to get Rath, and Ava and Amy - Rath and Ava both tried the spot without success. Rath went out to the parking lot to switch with Michael, and Amy found Liz and Kyle and Jim, and Michael tried - he could sense the same thing that Max and Isabel had, (and Ava said she did too, even more strongly maybe,) but no go. Kyle tried next, and he couldn't even detect anything.

"W-want me to go next?" Alex asked. It was getting weird, all of them gathered around in a classic huddle situation, but trying to at least pay lip service to the 'no looking at each other' rule.

"No, sweetie." Max caught a glimpse of Isabel rubbing Alex's arm - without either of them looking in each other's direction. "Well, maybe if we run out of other ideas. But... but there's someone else who's been deeply touched with alien powers, and I think she needs to go first."

"Me?" Liz asked. Max looked straight at her before he could stop himself - their eyes locked on each other, and the knowledge that it was supposedly 'forbidden' made that stare even more intense for Max - neither of them could break away for a long moment. "Oh - ohkay." Max circled around to hug Liz tightly for a moment, though he wasn't sure why. Then Liz stepped forward, planted the ball of her right foot exactly in the center of the circle... and without any obvious transition out of that movement, she was crumpling into a little heap on the floor.

"_Liz_!" Max cried out, staring at her without any concern for the rules of the Gallery now. He rushed forward, checked her pulse and her breathing without even thinking about it - both of them seemed strong. Liz was... was sleeping, or passed out or something. Except that it had happened as soon as she had hit the spot.

A few docents met them right outside the gallery, as Max, Kyle, Alex, and Jim carried Liz carefully out of the room, with everybody else around either clearing the way beforehand or... or hanging around worried and not sure what to do. For a crazy second, Max was worried that they'd be in some sort of trouble for breaking the rules of the exhibit, but that was the furthest thing from anybody's mind. "Is... is she okay?" a security guard asked, pushing past the docents. "What happened?"

"Umm..." Max took a deep breath, realizing that he was 'on.' "She... um, she seems to be fine, as far as I can tell, just fainted." He did his best to shrug. "Maybe... maybe being in there was just too weird for her - she's used to being the center of attention." Now where had _that_ idea come from? But it was as good an explanation as any to give to the outsiders.

"Maybe... maybe you should take her to the infirmary," one of the docents suggested. "Just to make sure she'll be okay."

"I... I don't think that'll be necessary," Amy Deluca said in her best 'mother knows best' tone, that Max had gotten pretty familiar with in the time he'd known her. "There's been a little bit too much excitement today, and we'll be leaving now. Just then, Liz moaned slightly, shifted her head back and forth, and managed to crack one eye open. "Liz, you fainted in the gallery. Do you feel all right?"

"Ummm... what g..." Liz broke off in the middle of what she'd been about to say. "Yeah, umm, I'm good. My arm is a little sore, but I can walk for myself." Soon she was on her feet, Max and Alex crowding protectively close on either side. And like that, they headed out of the museum, trying to attract as little attention as possible, out to the cars, and drove off. Max had the feeling that they'd probably already spent too much time in Pittsburgh - trying to investigate the University campus or something like that would be a mistake. Rath said that Shana had said to move on northeast, but Max wasn't sure about Shana's good intentions now, and he intended to get to Scranton and pay a visit to the Institute.

But that would have to wait on a bit more driving, obviously. Right now, as Rath maneuvered the motor home through the streets of downtown Pittsburgh, Liz looked up from the couch at the worried faces of Maria, Max, Alex, Isabel, and Ava. "Okay, come on, you guys are creeping me out," Liz muttered. "Did I really faint? What was this 'gallery' thing? And where the heck are we?"

Max sat down next to her and took Liz's hand in his. "Sweetheart," he whispered. "What's the last thing that you remember." Maria gasped slightly.

"Umm... the very last thing?" Liz asked, and Max went 'uh-huh.' "Umm... I guess that would be you suggesting that we pull off the road for a stretch and see if anybody wanted to switch and come into the van."

Max sighed and shook his head - that didn't really rule out much, though even the fact that she hadn't remembered the museum was disappointing enough. "Where... where were you at that point?" Isabel asked.

"Umm... something like a mile away from Dallas."

"Right," Max said, stunned by the notion. "Before we got to Dallas?"

"Yeah, of... Max, where are we?" Liz asked, a note of panic creeping into her voice.

Max didn't answer right away, so Ava jumped in. "Pittsburgh, Liz. It's been more than thirty-six hours since we were in Dallas."

"_What_?" Liz exclaimed, struggling to sit up. "What... what the heck happened to me? How could I lose that much time?" She turned to Max. "Did... did I really faint? Or..."

"Umm... that's the best word I can think of for what happened," Max said, "though it wasn't an ordinary faint, which should be pretty obvious." He took a deep breath. How could he begin to explain? Going back to the start, telling Liz about the overheard conversation in the nightclub, about shapeshifter sightings in Louisville and flashes from the Madisons seemed like - well, she wasn't in patient enough a mood to sit through all that. Start with the direct answer and let her work backward. "You were exposed to... to some kind of alien message, or maybe it was a booby trap disguised as a message. Somebody had left us flashes elsewhere in the museum, but this one was protected and didn't connect with any of us - until you tried to trigger it. Then you collapsed and - and we took you out. What happened afterward you know. As far as why we were in the museum in the first place - umm, that's kinduv a longer story."

"Did you **make** me touch whatever it was?" Liz flared. "Whatever this thing you're looking for is, is it worth the risk that you put me through?" Max recoiled from her words as if she'd physically belted him. He'd... he'd never have intentionally harmed Liz, but maybe, his curiosity and worry about Shana had made him careless. The possibility that the flash could have been intense enough to hurt seemed obvious in retrospect - he should have thought of that beforehand. And Liz **hadn't** wanted to go through with it. He hadn't physically forced her or directly guilt-tripped her, but...

"Hey, come on, girl," Ava said. "This... this isn't Max's fault." She squatted down next to Liz, taking her shoulders in a friendly and affectionate grip. "I understand why you're freaked - I'd probably be throwin' things if this had happened to me. But he's the last one you need to lash out at." Liz shuddered all over," (a motion that Max had to drag his mind guiltily out of the gutter from, even under the circumstances,) and made a bit of a 'hrrumph' sound. Max wondered if this was one of those situations where he should give her some space. Perhaps he could go up into the cab and copilot.

"Who's up for food?" Alex asked. "I know that we didn't get much breakfast this morning, and the whole scene in the museum was intense." He sighed. "Liz? Chicken fries?"

"Yeah, I could eat," she mumbled. Right, Max thought. Defiitely up into the cab.

"Hey, so that was freaky," Rath said to Max as he pulled out onto the main highway east. "Any idea what that thing means, what happened to Liz?"

Max didn't really feel that much like talking about it - but he wasn't sure that he could explain why. "There's a lot of possibilities I guess," he said. "That Liz really did get a flash, a big one, but because there was so much information, her mind's been somewhat overloaded, and that caused the confusion and partial amnesia. Or maybe the flash didn't work as it was supposed to, because Liz isn't really a hybrid - though that leaves open the question of why it didn't work for any of us."

"True," Rath admitted. "Or... or maybe because we're more alien than she is, our powers were able to protect us and keep the blast of mental energy from going off. But Liz was caught in between - just alien enough to trigger it, not enough to defend herself." Max scowled into his reflection in the windshield, but he had to admit that that explanation made sense. It also meant, if that was true, that he'd have been better off not insisting that everyone try to trigger the 'message' - and especially, that Liz shouldn't have.

"I... I just hope that she gets better," Max admitted. "From what little I know, amnesia is usually pretty good like that - doesn't tend to go on for ages and ages like they often have it in the movies. Then again, even remembering so much as a day under amnesia is - actually, I'm not sure if that's unusual. Forgetting everything about who you are and who all your friends and family are - that's completely fake, but that's not what's happened to Liz."

"Okay, I kinda get the feeling that you want a new topic," Rath said, and Max laughed slightly. "Any ideas what's next? Scranton, and the Institute, I guess... but what do we do there? And what about afterwards... we've kinduv been getting led by pieces of the Shana mystery for a little while now, but unless we get a clue in Scranton that points to - I dunno, to Boston or somewhere, then we're out in the cold."

Max laughed slightly. "Keep heading for Maine, I guess, steering well clear of the outskirts of New York City I think. Boston shouldn't be too bad - I just have a bad feeling about New York, and I don't think it's because of you guys. Well, not directly - but Kivar might have had people investigating your lair." Rath's hands twitched slightly on the steering wheel, but the motor home didn't sway in the slightest as a response. "Once we get there... I'm not sure - sit tight for a bit and see if the bad guys are breathing down our necks. If they are - then we'll have to make a desperate move. Probably try going off at right angles, and heading into the wilds of Quebec."

"Eww, Canadian people speaking french?" Rath complained, and Max laughed slightly.

"Let's hope it won't have to come to that." Rath grunted an agreement. "Or maybe, if we turn around and hunt the hunter, just when he's not expecting it, we can take him by surprise and... well, that depends on how much backup he's still got with him." Max sighed. "Did we hear anything since Birmingham?"

"Umm, yeah, actually." Rath's voice was serious. "Atlanta, Chattanooga, Knoxville. Possibly heading up from Knoxville towards Lexington."

Max's stomach sank. "Lexington isn't that far from Cincinnatti, is it?" Rath made a 'nuh-uh' response. So that was it. Kivar had taken a diversion, but he was within striking distance of meeting up to their trail, not that far behind them. And they still had no particular idea how they were going to get rid of him, or escape more rhoroughly.

Also, at this point the conversation seemed to die out utterly. Max had no idea what more to say to Rath, and Rath didn't seem to have any conversation ideas either.

So when Ava came up to visit with Rath a few minutes later, Max practically jumped out of the co-pilot's seat so that the two of them could hang out.

#

"I... I wouldn't worry about Liz too much," Isabel whispered to Max. They were sitting - well, lying, up in the sleeping alcove, which seemed a bit odd, but it was one of the only places in the motor home aside from the cab to slip away for a private conversation, and you couldn't just 'slip into' the cab on a whim. "Ava told her a lot about what she missed from her blank-out period while you were up with Rath, and I think she's calmer and less upset about things now. It'd probably be a mistake to, oh, say - switch out to the van without her. Might make her feel like you were abandoning her in her hour of need."

Max sighed. "I did think about it - just so that she'd have some space, and be able to cool off - but if you think it's the wrong move, then I won't." He sighed. "Did what Ava told her ring any bells, or is she just remembering things at most second-hand now."

"No, I don't think they sparked off any direct memories." Isabel mulled over what that meant. "Maybe... maybe it would be worthwhile connecting her, to check and see if there's any mental damage that will show up to your powers."

"Yeah, I should probably ask her about that." Max peeked out, saw that Liz was talking with Alex and Maria, and seemed to have a half-smile on her face. "But it doesn't have to be _right_ yet, does it?" Isabel shrugged. "There's something else I wanted to ask about. Kivar seems... well, there was the Birmingham thing, but otherwise he seems to have a pretty good idea about where we are, and I don't know how. We haven't done anything that would get us on news reports, which is our major source of information about _his_ movements. Is... is it possible that he's homing in on us with alien powers somehow - locking in on our mental energy, or detecting bodies with hybrid physiology, or something like that?"

"You... your guess is as good as mine," Isabel muttered, though obviously the topic was burdening her too. "Nothing that... that Michael and I found out about when we were off-world seems to relate to this kind of thing. Then again - well, we never really found out how much those pentagon thingees could do, and whether the Skins from copper summit had them."

"Hmm." Max cast his mind back to nearly a year ago. "Possible. If the Skins had any notion that there were so many aliens in Roswell, I think that they'd have sent more people than Whittaker to start with."

"Maybe the tracking technology can't tell one person from many that well," Isabel suggested. "That wouldn't keep Kivar from following a signal, assuming that there aren't so many other aliens in America that he'd lose track."

"Hmm." Max blinked, starting to think about this more seriously. "And maybe he did, or he decided to follow a feint - from another alien who, either deliberately or unwittingly, lured him south to Birmingham. This is starting to make quite a bit of sense." He sighed. "But I'm not sure how we can escape, if he has a radar lock on our ass. We could try splitting up - but that only saves a part of the team, not everybody. At best."

"Maybe something will turn up," Isabel said uncertainly. "I mean, we still don't know if Shana is friendly or not. Maybe she'll actually help us get away from the Overlord." She sighed. "Or... I dunno, somehow I don't have much faith that Tess will be able to do something useful to help."

"I guess those are our chances," Max muttered uncertainly. "Slim and none."

"I don't know if Shana is exactly a slim hope," Isabel replied. "Unless you mean that she's skinny, which - well, even then I didn't really get that impression. Well, maybe as the older lady - they tend to either get stout or skinny I guess, and since she was 'frail' I guess that would be more on the skinny side. Young Shana was supposed to be **curvy**, right?"

"Umm, I'm not sure that anybody said that outright, but yeah, I got that impression," Max agreed. "Probably not quite as curvy as you."

"Oh, by the way," Isabel said. "I just remembered. Did you ask Rath again about the flash that he got? Considering what happened to Liz, the importance of the exact phrasing is probably even more important there."

"Hmm, no," Max admitted. "That went clean outta my head, but it's a good point." He sighed. "On the other hand, I don't really want to go into the cab then and bug Ava if she's in the middle of a conversation with Rath."

"Well, you could try the new intercom." The response surprised Max, mostly because Isabel hadn't said it. Max poked his head out of the alcove and saw Alex perching there on the ladder. "Hey, sorry, I didn't really mean to listen in, I was just checking on Isabel, and kinduv - well, I didn't want to interrupt you guys while you were on a roll, and wasn't sure about leaving either."

"It's okay, man," Max said, waving Alex up, and after a moment's pause he came crawling into the alcove - which was pretty crowded with the three of them, although they could fit, since they didn't really each need all of the space available for one person to sleep in relative comfort. "So, you really got an intercom system rigged up? I wasn't sure that it'd even be possible, and I only passed along the idea..." Max tried to think of how many hours ago it had been, and then gave up. "It doesn't involve calling Ava's cell phone, does it?"

Alex laughed back. "No. In fact, I decided to eschew broadcast-based options, like walkie talkies, entirely for this one - though we could've extended the link to include the van that way."

"But using walkie talkies means that someone else could listen in, right?" Isabel asked, and Alex nodded. "And we can still get some walkies and talk with the van that way if we need to."

"Actually, I've already got the walkies, and I gave one to Michael before he left in the van," Alex remarked. "But as far as the cab intercom went... I was able to refit a home intercom system - the kind that sends signals through the electrical wiring, to work off of the motor home's power system."

"Wow, are you sure that that's safe?" Max asked. "I mean, I wouldn't want to accidentally short anything and have to get the battery repaired, or something like that."

"That's very unlikely to happen," Alex replied. Max considered him, and then decided to take that at face value. "Okay, let's give it a try."

They had to go down to the kitchen table, because that was where Alex had installed the intercom unit in the back, and Max was very aware of Liz's eyes, still a little angry, locked onto him. "Umm, hello?" Max asked while pressing down the button. "Rath?"

There was a short pause, presumably while Rath figured out what had happened and where the intercom control was. "Yeah?"

"Isabel, umm, she was wondering if you'd figured anything else out about the exact words of your flash. Considering what happened to Liz, it's kind of even more important now."

"Oh." Rath sighed, and Max waited anxiously for a moment. "Yeah, I, umm, I think so, but I can't concentrate on that while I'm driving."

"I can spell you, Rath," Liz suddenly announced. Max smiled slightly at her, and indicated with a gesture that he hadn't been holding the button down right, so she came closer to the box and repeated her offer.

"Umm, okay," Rath said. "Ava will hold the steering wheel and accelerator pedal steady while I get out and you come in. Be ready, she can't do it forever." So, the exchange was carried out fairly efficiently, and Maria quietly picked up a pad of paper and a pencil, getting ready to take down what Rath remembered without making a big deal that could give him a nervous fit about it.

"Okay, let's see. 'Everything was worked out - they didn't tell Rayde because she couldn't tell you anyway, not over the broadcast where Kivar could overhear. Rick' - or Rrak or something like that - 'Rick was supposed to come to Roswell and tell you the plan. But he had no end of trouble getting in, we thought it was because Dave was sick, but turns out it was because he was better. Your fault, Max, though you couldn't have known. By the time Rick found another, you were long gone.'"

"Rick and Dave?" Isabel repeated, sounding uncertain. "This... this wouldn't have anything to do with the Dave guy I met in Vegas, would it?"

"No, I don't think so," Max said slowly. "I don't think it'd be my fault that Dave was better." The names were prodding at the edge of his mind though, as if they were something that he should be better familiar with, except that they weren't being said the way he was used to hearing them.

"This doesn't seem to really fit with the idea that Shana was trying to trick us into anything at the museum," Alex decided. "If it did, she'd probably have said something that was _less_ cryptic. I... I think she really was/is trying to help us, but everything has gone wrong on her. Including the last message - one that was specifically intended for Liz, turning out to be too much for her to deal with, at least right away."

"Hmm." Max considered that. "Well, maybe. I'm still not wild about some of the stuff it looks like she's been up to, especially the stuff involving the kid and the Institute." He sighed. "It's tempting to just let subtlety go hang when we get to Scranton, bust into the Institute and start kicking ass and taking names."

"Yeah, I understand that impulse," Rath agreed. "But that might not be the smartest thing, if they either happen to have any other aliens around at the moment, or some fancy alien-derived weapons."

"True I suppose." Max sighed. "Well, we've got time, and I've spent enough talking about Kivar and Shana stuff for now. Let's try extreme diplomacy again - if I can whup your butts, Rath, Isabel. then I'll know I'm ready to give Lonnie a rematch."

"Okay, bring it on," Isabel laughed, and pulled the card decks out to start shuffling.


	10. Chapter 10: Holoconversation in Scranton

"Okay, I'm really bored now," Maria complained. "How long until we get to Scranton?"

"Umm, well, we just passed the turnoff for Penn state a little while back, yeah?" Isabel replied, looking at the map.

"For State College," Alex corrected. "I'm not sure that's the same thing as Penn State."

"Ehh, whatever." Isabel blew dismissively. "Sounds like still two hours or a little bit more." Maria groaned. "We can arrange another stretch and switch. I'm sure you'd like to spend some time with Michael."

"Yeah, thanks, maybe that'll help." Maria said. "I'll make the call."

"No, don't use the cell, try the walkie," Alex encouraged her.

"Umm, okay, where the hell is it, then?" Maria replied, looking around. Alex pulled out a fairly big and bulky looking box, (well, big in comparison to their cell phones, but still easily holdable in one hand.) with a long antenna pointing out of it, and handed it over to Maria. "Okay, umm... 'Maria calling van, Maria calling van. Come in, van!'"

There was a moment's pause. "Umm, there's nobody named Van over here," another voice replied. It was Kyle. "Maybe you'd better check your frequency and try again."

"Don't try to be funny, Kyle, I'm not in the mood for it," Maria said, just a bit snappishly. "Stretch and swap. Sound good?"

"Umm... yeah, I think so," Kyle agreed. "We're more than ten car lengths behind you just at the moment, I think, so we'll head over to the left and watch for you on the shoulder."

"Really, that far?" Max asked, but of course Maria hadn't been pressing the button to pass on his comment, and Max shook his head at her that she shouldn't bother trying to repeat - it didn't really matter much, anyway. He did wonder why they'd been lagging behind so much, though. "Umm... can someone else tell..."

"Oh, come off it Max," Isabel interrupted him. "You're not afraid of Liz, and you don't really need to walk around on eggshells around her, I think. Use the damn intercom yourself."

Max shrugged, and decided not to bother with the intercom, but instead headed directly up into the cab. "Umm. we're doing a stretch and switch," he said, one volume notch above a mumble. "That is, err, if it's okay with..."

"Of course it's fine by me," Liz said, also sounding a little grouchy, but when she looked up into the mirror, she had a smile on her face that made Max feel warm inside. "Getting a bit tired of steering this big guy anyway." She took a deep breath. "And maybe the two of us can have a quick walk and talk before we have to go back inside."

Max grinned broadly himself. "I... I'd like that." Of course, he didn't know exactly what the talk would be like, but he had some decently - um, above mid-level hopes. All of a sudden he had to grab onto the walls of the cab as Liz pulled off onto the shoulder, a little more quickly than was advisable.

"Um, oops."

"That's okay," Rath called from in the back. "We're all okay here, no injuries I think."

Liz smiled at Max again, undid her seat belt, and hopped out of her door. Max thought about trying to crawl over the driver's seat, and then elected to just hurry out the side door from the kitchen area. It wasn't long before Liz had rushed around to meet him. (Max would have tried rushing around too, but figured that (a) the side away from traffic, where he was, was where they both wanted to be anyway, and (b) if they both managed to start circling in the same direction they could be chasing each other too long and losing too much time. Max reached out to take Liz's hand, slowly enough as to give her a chance to pull it back, but she didn't, and they headed out into the cornfield that stood by the side of the road. Max had never actually seen a cornfield before, and was surprised at how high the stalks rose. Probably not quite as high as an elephant's eye, if that old song was about corn, but...

"I - I'm sorry, I guess I kinduv overreacted," Liz admitted. "We always take risks when there's a mystery or a dangerous situation, and... and just because you encouraged me to do this, and it was uncomfortable to start with, that doesn't give me an excuse to beat up on you about it." She managed to somehow swing herself into Max's embrace without him even intending to put his arms around her. "Maybe it'll yet turn out to pay off the trauma when the rest of my memories come back."

Max smiled. "Have you been getting things, already?"

"Oh, yeah," Liz assured him. "I - I guess I probably should have told you that earlier, but - well, never mind about that. So far it's been coming back to me in bits and pieces. How scared I was when you woke up in my arms, in that campground outside Columbus. Isabel sweettalking the guys in Dallas who first told us about Shana. The face of the little boy - Jennifer Madison's son - the one who I got the flash off of. A few other things that aren't as dramatic."

"Hmm." Max thought about that. "You don't remember the flash you got from the kid yourself? The one about the Institute in Scranton?" Liz shook her head. "Well, maybe that'll come, or - worst comes to worst, I think you told me a lot about it." He sighed. "I'm just glad that you're not pissed at me any more."

"Me too," Liz agreed, standing up on the front part of her feet and letting her lips slide across Max's neck - or start to. "Eyy... you need to do something about grooming habits, Maxxie boy. Your chin is getting way too whiskery."

"Hmm." Max ran a hand across his face from one cheek to another - yeah, definite pre-beardage happening there. "Sorry. I remembered to pack shaving cream and disposable razors and everything, it's just... shaving in that little bathroom in the motor home seems like it'd be a bad idea. And I don't usually tend to shave except when I've just gotten up, because that's when the skin's supposed to be least stretched out or something like that."

"Maybe you should take a risk," Liz teased him. "If you cut yourself, you can heal it after all, right?" A new thought struck her. "Or, on the other hand, just use your alien powers to shave."

"Duh, why did I never think of that?" Max laughed. Well, actually, it was something that had occured to him, but he thought his parents might think it was weird if he was never leaving tiny little bits of stubble in the sink, like his Dad did. But things had changed now. "Okay, we'll try that together, once we get back. You can hold the mirror steady for me."

"I'll try," Liz assured him. "Okay, got any kind of plan sorted out for Scranton?"

"Not sure," Max admitted. "We need to get into the Institute, and find out some about what's going on there. Being too violent is probably too risky a move, but maybe a calm and confident approach will work. Just walk in and say that we want to see whoever's in charge."

"Hmm... could work," Liz admitted. "Even if I don't have my memories, and regardless of which approach you take - I want to go in too, okay?" Max hesitated. "I realize that you probably want to keep me safe, but I have the feeling that this could be personally important. And maybe I'll see something that reminds me of my flash, which could lead to an important connection."

"Alright, you'll be right next to me," Max promised her, and immediately started to revise his strategy for the Institute in terms of keeping Liz safe.

"Come on, Max!" Isabel's voice called from the edge of the cornfield. "We're leaving in a minute, with or without you!"

"Yeah, right," Liz whispered. Max agreed that it was unlikely that they'd get stranded at this point, but on the other hand, he didn't want to piss their friends off, or call Isabel's bluff, because she'd probably think of some way to make him regret it. When they climbed back into the motor home, nobody else was still standing around and the van was already pulling off onto the highway. Laurie, Michael, Maria, Jim, and Amy were all sitting around the kitchen table and coffee table. "Hey, who's driving us?" Liz asked as she felt the home begin to move.

"Alex, with Isabel navigating," Jim Valenti explained. Max thought about that. It left Kyle in the van with the three New York kids... he hoped that the boy was up to it. Kyle certainly seemed to be spending a lot of time near Lonnie... did that mean that he was deliberately giving her an opportunity to chase him - or that he was chasing her himself? Well, that wasn't really his business.

"It's kinda crowded in here," he pointed out. "Liz and I will be in the sleeping chamber, if nobody else wants it." To Liz alone, nearly into her ear, he whispered, "Don't forget to grab a mirror." She smiled and sorted through the luggage compartment for a while before following him in.

When Max got his first look at himself in the mirror that Liz produced, (which was larger than he'd expected, a rectangle with rounded corners more than a foot long, and about seven and a half inches wide,) he was surprised at just how ragged and unkempt he looked. He'd been trying to take care of himself as much as possible, but there had been so many other things weighing on their minds - only a few things that could be done in the tiny little motorhome bathroom, and nobody had wanted to waste much time at a stationary bathroom facility. Concentrating, Max worked on other things with his powers before worrying about the beard, cleansing out his face and hair, trimming the 'do' a bit where it was getting ragged, and then looked down at his clothes, doing what he could to straighten and freshen them up. Then he concentrated on the long whiskery stubble, zapping away every little hair that he could, which took a while even with his powers, especially since he didn't want to bother skin. By the time he was done, Liz was giggling and smiling broadly.

"Okay, now, do me!" she exclaimed softly when Max looked up at her.

"Shave you?" he asked, trying not to let his smile get too big.

"Well, actually... if you WANT to, that'd probably be a very good idea," Liz said, stretching out her legs toward him. Max realized that Liz was wearing pantyhose on under her black denim skirt, and thought about what that implied. "Actually, I meant, just kinduv cleaning and freshening me up, like you did to yourself. That is, if it's okay, if it wouldn't be weird for you."

"No, certainly I don't mind," Max insisted, and extended out his powers towards Liz. Cleaning her face, her entire head actually, and brushing out her hair was easy. Smoothing the rumpled lines of her clothes and cleaning the slightly unfragrant buildups underneath was... well, it wasn't really difficult in a technical sense, but it was an unusual experience for Max. He'd seen and touched the parts of Liz's body that were underneath her clothes, though not terribly often yet. But sensing them this fashion, and 'touching' her, after a fashion, for practical reasons rather than as a prurient exercise was new. Curious, Max tried to reach his powers underneath Liz's hose and deal with the leg hair growng there. That was a mixed success - he was able to seperate the hair from the skin, and even reduce the hairs into dust and powder if he concentrated on them hard enough, but he still could not easily remove the remains from underneath the thin fabric, and it was clear that Liz was finding the dust, in particular, quite irritating. "Umm, sorry."

"No, that's okay," Liz assured him. "Just, umm, need to take care of this." And, quite quickly,. she pulled her running shoes off and then yanked the pantyhose away from her feet in a single extended motion, doing her best to shake the material out. "I, I hope that whoever uses the chamber next doesn't complain about the hair," Liz muttered, "I, I just..."

"It'll be okay," Max promised, disintegrating as many hairs as he could find once they were loose, which was hopefully most of them. In the progress, he crawled over beside Liz, and he nearly rested about a third of his weight on Liz's thigh before realizing that that probably wouldn't be comfortable for her. However, the sensation of their bare skin touching came back to him from retrospect with a powerful impact - his palm, his fingers firmly touching Liz's unclothed thigh, her soft skin now completely hairless and sleek... "Oh, my!" He brought his hand back to where it had been, without putting as much pressure on it.

Liz giggled. "Well, now that we've straightened ourselves out, I suppose it was inevitable that one person get the urge to go and ruffle everything up again." Max fondled the flesh under his hand. "Or maybe two people." She giggled as Max moved up to kiss her.

"You don't mind, do you?" he teased. "We can always tidy up again later."

"Yeah, but then that'll just bring on yet another attack of the lust bunnies," Liz pointed out. "We're too good looking. Being ruffled and in disarray is just the only way we'll ever possibly be able to keep our hands off each Ohhh!"

Neither of them said much for the next twenty-five minutes or so. There were a lot of lips and tongues working, but not in ways that actually made too much sound, just faintly muffled grunts. And then, after the tongue part, Liz showed him something that apparently she'd been fantasizing about for the past nine months, 'though the way I originally dreamed of it, we were in a much nicer bed, that wasn't moving. Oh well, you work with what you're given, I guess.' Max definitely thought that Liz was great at making the best of her natural abilities, and by the time the two of them were done, he was fighting to stay awake through a soothing wave of pleasure that flowed back and forth between the two of them.

"We, we shouldn't fall asleep," Liz mumbled. "Especially not all naked and after-glowy like this. Someone will eventually work up the nerve to check on us after the convoy makes it to Scranton..."

"Yeah," Max said, nuzzling Liz's cheek and barely managing to touch a lock of her long dark hair, "but I don't think we have much choice." He yawned, and wondered if he'd have a weird dream again. Then he wondered if Kivar would be able to dreamwalk him agai-

#

"So, you made a play for sweet little Ava, and she dumped you to get with my boy Rath," Lonnie said to Kyle, as they zoomed down the highway. Kyle was behind the wheel of the van, Lonnie stretched out across the shotgun seat, and Rath and Ava were somewhere in the back, probably snoozing next to each other.

"Umm, how did you know that?" Kyle asked, surprised. "I mean, umm, did somebody mention it to you, or..."

"Nah, nothing like that," Lonnie admitted. "Just kinduv sensed it. I think my powers have been developing along that way for a long time yet. I'm not as good at specific mental contacts as Isabel is, with her dreamwalking rap, but... but I think I'm inside the heads of everybody around me, all the time, but only just a little bit, and on a level that I don't pick up subconsciously." She sighed. "Every so often, though, I'll put together enough to figure out something that nobody's told me, and it just kinduv pops up into the part of my brain where I know where everything is, and it's like, 'oh, okay.' Almost always right when that kind of thing happens, and when I'm not completely accurate, it's usually something close that led me to a slightly wrong conclusion."

"Huh, that's interesting," Kyle admitted. "In a way, it's almost the mirror image of Isabel's talent - she connects her highly aware mind into the subconscious of other people - into their dreaming lives. You can connect your subconscious mind into things that the people around you are aware of."

Lonnie grinned. "Yeah, that kinda fits. Or maybe into their subconscious, not actual dreams, but the sort of stuff that's floating around in the background when they're walking around."

"It's mostly the same stuff, I think," Kyle decided. "The dreams are just what happens to the walk-floaty stuff after you go to bed, because none of it's been dealt with yet."

"Hmm." Lonnie thought about that. "Maybe I should try to pay attention to my dreams then, because some of what my powers are telling me might come through there." She sighed. "Of course, it'd help if I could direct it at least a little bit, instead of getting pot luck."

"May just take a little time to get that way." Kyle chuckled slightly. "I know you probably get sick of Star Wars comments, but that vaguely sounds like something Jedi I might have heard while surfing around for stuff about the new movie next year. Some kind of power about being able to truly see what was going on in the hearts of people around you." Lonnie shrugged at that. "Okay, and we're done with the Star Wars reference."

"Yeah." Lonnie sighed. "So... somebody mentioned that you went and signed up for Buddhism after you found out about aliens..."

"Oh, lord, am I going to get crap about it from you too?" Kyle sighed. "Well, first of all, no, I didn't 'sign up' for Buddhism - nobody's taking registration or anything like that. I... I just picked up a few books, and I'm trying to practice what I've been learning about in my life. It's kinduv a personal thing, so..."

"Well, umm..." Lonnie dropped her voice a bit, just as if she didn't want Rath to be able to overhear what she was saying, if he were awake. "I wasn't about to give you *crap* about it, but if it's that private, we can just drop it."

Kyle spent a long moment thinking about it. "Lonnie, if you were going to ask me a serious question about my faith, by all means go ahead."

Another long pause. "I... I'm not sure if I have a specific question so much," Lonnie finally said in a very small stream of words. "Just... I dunno, I've been thinking about stuff, especially since... well, I'm not made of stone, any more than Rath was. I - I laughed at him, when he wanted to get out of the kind of life we'd gotten ourselves into, to do something worthwhile. Not - not so much because I thought it wasn't worthwhile, but because I thought he didn't stand a chance. Next time I see him, he's with you guys, and he's done this incredible thing - he's saved somebody's life, and... well, and not just anybody. Alex... Alex is one of the good ones. I - I could tell that from the first time I laid eyes on him, actually."

"And that's why you teased him about threesomes?" Kyle put in. "And, um, a few nitpicks here. One, you met Rath between when you guys had the falling out, and when he and Ava had saved Alex life, right? He said that once he and Ava had met up, compared notes, figured out their mission, they went back to Manhattan to try to recruit you."

"Okay, okay, so I glossed over some of the details," Lonnie said, her voice unimpressed. "Big deal. It sounded better that way, and it doesn't really change the point."

"And also, how did you know that they'd had anything to do with saving Alex's life when we met you in... ohh." Kyle trailed off a little with that single vowel sound. "I... I guess Max mentioned something, because that was the message we wanted you to send to Isabel if you could... that Alex was okay." He thought. "And I suppose your powers clued you in that Rath and Ava had been seriously involved in that?"

"That, and a little common sense," Lonnie shot back in a sarcastic tone that somehow reminded him of Elixa Dushku on 'Buffy.' "I mean, Max mentioned that Isabel thought Tess had killed him. If he'd been saved from alien attack without anyone realizing that he was okay, it just kind of stood to reason that a few aliens who nobody realized were in Roswell had saved him."

"Okay, yeah," Kyle nodded. "So, basically, you saw that Rath got it done - he redeemed himself, or at least started to make up for what he'd done. And you realized that maybe it was possible for you, and maybe it was something you wanted."

"That's the it in a nutshell, little grasshopper," Lonnie sighed. "But still not sure on the how... aside from helping Max and the rest of your friends as much as I can, and not pulling any fast ones on them."

"Yeah, that helps," Kyle admitted. "Maybe trying to stay open in case one of the girls actually makes the first move of friendship with you... I'm not sure if Liz is quite ready to handle another gal pal at the moment... but maybe Ava would like to start over again with you. Or Maria, just possibly she'd be interested."

*Okay, come on, Max, what are you doing out here?* The words were not really a voice, and it took a moment for any of Max's consciousness to recognize that there actually WAS any of him in the van for them to be addressed to.

*Umm... I'm not sure. I didn't want to be here, but my dream took me here.* His awareness tried to look around, but without eyes, it was had to orient.

"Who said that?" Lonnie asked.

"Who said what?"

*Oh, now you've done it. Lonnie can sense that we're here somehow.*

*Are we here? Who are you, anyway,* Max complained. *This is so confusing.*

*It's Isabel,* the reply came. *I... I tried to dreamwalk you, because we're getting close to Scranton, but I'm not sure that you're really dreaming, at least, not dreaming as we know it. Your dream self has actually travelled out to the van and is listening to what Lonnie and Kyle are doing and saing right at this moment, except that neither of us have brought our body identities with our dream selves the way it normally works. Just... just don't resist me, and I think I can draw us both out of the dream, and back into ourselves. 'Kay?*

*Umm, sure,* Max replied, and even though the sensation of what happened next was very strange and nearly impossible for him to describe later, he concentrated on allowing Isabel to complete what she was trying - and then he was back in the sleeping chamber, with Liz.

"Come on, babe," he said, shaking her very gently and carefully, and slipping quickly into his own pants. Liz looked up at him, sighed sleepily, and pulled her upper body off of the mattress into a pose that was enormously (and unwittingly, Max guessed,) arousing to him, especially the way her breasts swang back and forth just slightly. "We're almost there. Got to make ourselves presentable again."

As he used his powers to comb their hair and freshen the clothes again, Max thought about what... about what Isabel had said in the dream, assuming that really was Isabel. Had he somehow moved from memory dreams into a true out of body experience? That was a little disturbing as something that had happened beyond his control, but if the technique could be refined into a more accessible technique - it could be VERY useful. Depending on how easy it would be for other aliens to sense him eavesdropping, of course. Even Lonnie hadn't clued in until Isabel arrived and started yelling at him.

"Okay, what's up?" Liz asked as she opened the door, and Max hurried to finish buttoning up his shirt.

#

"Okay, this is it," Rath said, pointing at the building. "Drazen Institute. Who goes in, and what's the line?"

"Do you want to stay behind again, Isabel?" Max asked, and she nodded. "Okay, then, um - me, Liz, Michael, Ava, and Lonnie go in. Pretty much play it by ear, but do anything that we can to make it awkward for them to get rid of us. Hopefully that'll lead to something useful. If they're involved with aliens, or ARE aliens, then probably they know that there are other aliens around. Maybe they even know about us. And I doubt that they'd want to be the first to initiate hostilities, before they know what powers we've got."

"Hmm, that's not bad," Rath decided. "I guess I stay behind and help watch the women and children?" This remark didn't really go over well with Isabel, (who was leaving Alex behind,) or Jim, (who wouldn't get to go either.) There was a little fuss over trying to make the five of them about as imposing as possible, and then they headed out and marched into the office. There was a reception area out front - what seemed like a very ordinary space - comfortable seats, a big wide desk made out of some richly dark wood... end tables covered with fairly ordinary magazines. A few people were waiting outside... a man in his early thirties, wearing business casual wear, and a mother with two daughters, probably twelve years old and nine. After taking as much in at a glance, Max strode up to the guy behind the desk - he was on the old side, maybe in his fifties or so, and something about him just screamed 'flunky.'

"Hi, I'm Max Evans, and I want to see.."

"Evans?" Slightly startled, the guy went scrambling among papers in front of his desk, and then scanned down one of them. Max leaned over and realized that the sheet he was holding included little snapshot, though he couldn't be sure of anything else on it. "Umm, yes, just a minute. You've been expected."

That, Max had to admit, was not at all the response he - well, was not what HE expected. Liz seemed taken aback too. "Expected?"

"Umm... maybe not really," Flunky continued, getting up out of his chair and looking around for something that Max wasn't sure of. "That probably isn't the best word I could have used, given that I don't think anyone was sure that you WOULD come here, Mister Evans. Umm... Miss Parker?" Liz nodded. "Mister Guerin?" The flunky nodded at Michael, but didn't seem to pay any attention to Lonnie or Ava, possibly because he didn't know any last names he could be very polite to them with. (Ava had only just picked her last name a few days before they left Roswell, after all, and if Lonnie used one then Max didn't know it himself. She might have taken on the full name of Vilandra Liaret, after her opposite number back on earth.)

But the flunky was continuing to run around as if he were a chicken who had had his head cut off a little while ago and was just settling down to that fact, and he started talking again. "We, we were informed that you just MIGHT drop in, and - umm, I'm supposed to bring you to a teleconference room first, if that's all right." Somehow he made the end of that sentence into a question.

Max looked around himself, checking every member of the team for their reactions, and faintly prodding his mind to see if he could tell whether Isabel was 'linked' to him. This really didn't seem to fit into their plan, but - well, the guy wasn't making them leave, by any means, and this didn't seem to make sense as part of a trap or a hostile reaction. Max was curious to see who would be talking to them in the teleconference room, from where, and how, and he wanted to see if anybody else had objections. Nobody seemed to, though Lonnie was a bit steamed.

Possibly this was because of her wardrobe as much as being ignored by the flunky. Liz and Isabel had convinced Lonnie that she needed to dress up in slightly different clothes for this Institute visit, that even a trace of punk could make it easier for the Insittute staffers to insist that they all had to leave. There had been a considerable row about that, with Lonnie's fierce independence clashing against the more cautious sensibilities of the other girls, and possibly a faint impulse on their part to exert control over a rival. Lonnie's temper had exploded in front of the group, shouting, "Do you think I'm some kind of damn dress-up doll, that you can just strip down and put on whatever clothes you damn well please? I don't fuckin' think so..." while stripping off some of her own clothes as if that proved the point. Even Max had found it a bit hard to look away from Lonnie, and Maria had hit Michael rather hard because she said he'd been staring too much.

But at this point Lonnie was indeed in somewhat subdued clothing, though an outfit that had still more or less met her own standards too - a short business skirt, sort of Ally McBeal-ish, and a pale cream blouse that was just slightly tight on her and just slightly translucent. The locks of hair falling down the side of her face were gone, brushed back behind her ears perhaps, and her nose piercing had been taken out for the time being. She looked very much like Isabel might have, actually, if she'd dressed up in the same outfit and turned her hair a bit darker. Ava was also looking a bit more like Tess than usual, wearing a fancy blue sweater and long skirt.

"Um, are we going, Max?" Liz whispered, and Max realized that the flunky had stepped away from his desk, and seemed to be expecting them to follow him down a corridor leading away from the reception area. Michael had already taken several steps in that direction, but everybody was looking at Max as if expecting him to make the final decision. He shook his head, squeezed Liz's hand slightly, (they'd been holding each others' since coming in,) and hurried to catch up. Just as they were leaving the reception area, Max happened to look over his shoulder and see a woman appear and go behind the desk - maybe she was flunky's replacement.

They were led through a few narrow corridors, lit by warm yellow-ish incandescent lamps hanging from the ceiling, and bordered by walls in the same kind of dark brown wood as the desk had been made of. Most of the doors that they passed by had little electronic card-reader locks on them, and were shut tight. One happened to be half open, but all that Max could see were a few people crowding around two computer workstations, and some chalk drawings on a green-board on the wall.

Finally, they were led into a room, with a small conference table, several rooms, and what looked like some sort of very fancy projector pointing at a screen on the wall. Max looked more closely around the screen and noticed a few things that could have been camera pickups. One spot on the table had what looked like a closed laptop built right into it. Aside from that, there were no controls in the room at all except for the light switch on the wall near the door. There were two windows in the opposite wall, big tall windows with the sort of vertical blinds that are attached to each other with little lengths of chain, and they were closed. Also a few whiteboards on the walls towards the back of the room, opposite the screen, with those colored dry-erase markers on metal ledges near the bottom of the boards. The flunky nodded slightly once they were all in, and moved to draw the door closed, leaving them.

"No," Max said firmly. "The door stays open until we shut it." Flunky considered this a moment, and then shrugged. Maybe he guessed that Max was still slightly worried about getting attacked - he wanted his escape routes from this place to be as available as possible. Michael, who probably had the same thought, was checking out the windows.

Liz had taken the seat near the flipped-down sheet on the table, but she couldn't immediately open it up, it seemed to be fastened in the closed position. Just then, the lights in the room dimmed and the projector started working. Soon an impressive image showed up on the screen - an outdoor venue, perhaps, a park or the edge of woods - and a very attractive young woman with goldish-red hair looking at them. "It's her!" Ava exclaimed slightly. Max moved to get a closer look at the screen, and realized that the angle he was seeing the scene through shifted slightly with his change of perspective. Maybe not quite as much as it would have changed if the girl had been physically in the room with them, but obviously this picture had a holographic component to it. Technology beyond the state or the art as it was generally known, then, Max guessed, and probably alien in construction.

"And it is you," she said with a bit of a laugh. "I - I'm very curious just HOW you found out about me in the first place, but - well, it could hardly have come at a better time. Max, Michael, Liz... is Isabel there too?" She peered into the room, presumably examining another hologram that was formed from putting together the readings of several different cameras in their room. "You, I think, would be Isabel's New York alternate - Lonnie."

"This isn't fair," Liz pointed out. "You seem to know an awful lot about you, while we've been calling you Shana just because we don't know any name that you'd rather take."

"Shana?" She seemed to be slightly thrown by that. "Oh... because it has the sha- beginning from shapeshifter?" Liz shrugged slightly. "Well... that doesn't entirely suck, actually. But no, umm... you can call me Christin. With a ch... I know that's being picky, but... well, anyway."

"Isabel's outside in the car, keeping track of our mentalities and those of the people around us," Max said. "Just in case."

"Ahh. A worthwhile precaution." Christin sighed. "You didn't know whether to trust me, huh? I hope I can prove myself worthy of your faith, but anyway. I'm just across the New York state line right now, near a town called Corning. We've figured out where it's going to be - north of Albany, somewhere in the Adirondack state park."

"Where *what* is going to be?" Liz asked her. "And... well, this sort of thing is not the best way to get us to trust you."

Christin turned as if she were looking directly at Liz. "The... the third flash in the museum - did you find it? Did it not work right?"

"It kinda zapped my brain and gave me a case of amnesia!" Liz flared. "I kinduv hope that that's not 'working right,' but I'm not entirely sure how to tell." She stood up. "Who the hell are you, 'Christin'? Why are you here on Earth? What really happened n the museum with little Jenni? Why was she here, at this institute, before her son was born, with YOU? And why the hell aren't you giving us straight answers on anything?"

"I... I tried to explain this to you in the flash, but I guess I tried to stick in too much and that got counterproductive," Christin replied. "So, umm... I'm not going to explain everything in those questions, partly because the batteries I've got in the hologram rig out here are limited, and I can't stay here long anyway, there's a lot yet to do. I came to earth in the early fifties - been kind of a freelancer, working on behalf of a few different people, but never any of your enemies. Right now, I'm on Larek's payroll, and the mission is to help save the... the four of you, although I guess friends and hangers on come in the package deal, and to escort you safely off earth."

"Off of earth?" Max whispered, stunned by the notion. First Tess had said that the only way to be safe was to find a way to leave earth. Now Christin was... was apparently offering such a plan, in more detail, but Max was afraid of leaving everything he knew behind, maybe for good... and he still wasn't sure how much faith he could have in her. "Why... why didn't Larek try to..." And then, a bunch of things fell into place, including the dialog Rath had heard during his flash. "Oh, my god, of course. It wasn't Rick, but Larek... not Dave, but Davis - Brody Davis. Larek assumed that he could possess Brody at the last possible moment and tell us about his plan, but - but because Brody had - had zapped himself in his virtual reality computer program, and when I healed him, that did something to the brain channels that Larek used to communicate through him. So... so he had to find some other suitable pawn, and get him to Roswell - and by the time he did, we were long gone."

"Umm, yeah, that's pretty much it," Christin said, blinking slightly. "Of course, we didn't know that it was because of a virtual reality computer thing... or that you had a part in it." Christin sighed. "I was over in Kansas, trying to figure out if you'd gone through that way, when Jennifer Tanner... oops, it's Jennifer Madison now, called me, really upset because a bunch of unfamiliar aliens had visited her, trying to find out about me. I recognized you from her description, Max, and when she said she thought you'd got a flash of me saving her life, I caught a flight from Wichita to Pittsburgh."

"Okay," Max said. "We'll head towards the Adirondacks, and give you a chance to meet us in person, if you'll come clean about Jenni and the museum?" He tried to make his stare as intimidating as possible. "Did you put her life in danger so you could save her? Were you trying to earn her gratitude so that you could presume on her to help you out?"

"Um... the first, no," Christin insisted. "She had left her group, playing in one of the staff rooms, and the way she fell was entirely an accident. She could have died if I hadn't helped her." Christin said. "And no... I don't think I was thinking about taking advantage of her help when I healed her... but I won't deny that I've probably done some things that I shouldn't have since then, because I knew that she'd do anything she could to help me."

Liz shook her head slightly. "And what about her son?"

"I'm sorry, Liz, there really isn't time enough to get into that." Christin sighed. "I'll - I'll tell you when we next get a chance, I promise." She sighed. "And... and maybe we'll have a lot more to talk about, depending on if that flash comes back after a delay. Max - thanks for taking a flyer on me. I promise you, you won't regret it."

"Umm, well thanks," Max said. "Is there anything more you can tell us about..." But he stopped at that point, because Christin's image had disappeared, to be replaced by a kind of odd screensaver logo with a few brightly colored football shapes flying around, (seeming to get further away and then getting closer again too,) and gradually shifting shade. Then, all of a sudden, that blipped out too, the projector turned off, and the lights came up again. Max looked around, and suddenly realized that he'd forgotten to close the door once the conversation with Christin had started, though he'd been pretty sure they were not in any physical danger then. Oh, well. It probably didn't matter.

He closed it with a small flick of his mind now, and turned to the others. "Umm... okay, so we've got some new answers, a few questions. Sorry that I committed us to this Adirondack thing, but..."

"No, that's fair, Maxwell," Michael said. "I don't think anyone will question your call there. This thing is probably our only chance." He sighed. "Wish we knew more about what Larek's got planned, but I've got a few ideas. Specifically, I think he sent his own ship to Earth."

"Right," Ava replied. "Without Kivar noticing it?"

"Yeah," Michael agreed. "Probably a slower ship - maybe it's been on its way here ever since Isabel and I got back - and equipped with cloaking technology so that it can't be traced." He smiled. "Gotta admire the foresight, if that's it... figuring that we might need an escape vehicle to leave the planet far enough in advance to actually get it here."

"Well, if that's it, then we're going to have to start talking about who's willing to actually leave Earth forever, and how to keep those who won't safely behind. Umm... not that I wouldn't be willing to go with you, sweetie, uhh, Max," Liz rambled. "But - well, I was thinking of Mister Valenti, and Maria's mom, and even Michael's sister. They're kind of one foot into the alien abyss at this point - they've come with us for the ride so far, but I'm not sure it's fair to expect them to give everything up for our sake. And Kivar would probably not chase them too hard if he knew that you wouldn't be able to come back for them even if you wanted to."

"Yeah," Max agreed. "Well, come on, let's go."

"Tell the others?" Lonnie asked.

Max thought about that. "Maybe. I still want to see if I can get any other answers about this Institute, but if they stay clammed up, it's not like we don't have enough to worry about as it is." He sighed and turned back to the door, wondering for a second if he might have managed to lock himself in. But the door opened easily enough, and he looked back and forth. Return the way they had come, (he thought he remembered the turnings,) or go further into the maze? After hesitating for a long moment, he realized that a woman in a smart business suit was approaching them from the 'deeper maze' direction.

"Hello, Mister Evans," she said. "Umm... I'm not sure if you have any further questions at this point."

He smiled. "I do, actually. Can we talk in here a moment?" He gestured back to the conference room, and the new person nodded.

"My name is Dana Imeldus, and I'm the assistant director of the Insitute. Christin Anders was able to get in touch with you, I take it?"

"Yeah," Michael replied. "What's her connection to all of this?"

"Umm... she was one of the Institute's founders, back in 1959." Dana smiled slightly. "Don't suppose you'd find that as surprising as other people who've seen her looking so young. She and a few of her colleagues put together some funding and began the work into... well, I don't think you need all of the details."

"I'd appreciate some," Max said levelly. "What, exactly, does the Institute do? What are its aims?"

"I'm not sure you have a need to know that, *your majesty.*"

"I'm not sure that's good enough." Max sighed. "You're working with re-engineering Antarian technology into new applications using state of the art Earth electronics, I think, and working with experiments involving multi-species DNA integration. Either one could be incredibly dangerous, and disruptive to human society, and so I want to know what your objectives are."

Dana's smile was now definitely grim. "I understand your wants, Mister Evans. Now let me be equally clear about mine. I want you to get the hell out and not bother us again. You can take up your objections with Miss Anders, I think - she'll be meeting up with you later I hope. For now, though... this room has been equipped with a variant off of the Trithium resonator. If you make any untoward move, the pulse sent out will be strong enough to knock you out for at least an hour, Max. I'm not entirely sure if it'll have a strong enough effect on Liz to incapacitate her, but I think I have ways of dealing with her."

Lonnie growled, and Max groaned. "Okay, so we don't make our move in here," Lonnie argued. "But you can't get us to leave without letting us out. Out of range of the little doohickey."

"Very astute, Lonnie," Dana replied. "But I expect to have Max's word that you won't try anything foolish as you leave. If he tells you to play nice, I think you will."

"Forget about it, Lonnie," Max argued. "Let's just go. It's not worth the effort, not to mention the possibility that K will find out we were here if we raise too much of a fuss." Max was also worried about the fact that Dana might be keeping other surprises in reserve. He did *not* want to get into a fight over this. He'd always expected to back down if someone in the Institute threatened them, and now, after a fashion, they had. He got up and tried the door - it wasn't locked, and Dana didn't stop them from filing out. The five of them made their way back to the reception area, where a few new people were waiting. Max watched as the two sisters he'd noticed there before were led through a door into the other half of the building. What was going on there? Were those girls partially hybrid too? In for a check-up with Institute doctors, since they couldn't go for a blood test with regular medical professionals, any more than Max or Isabel had been able to?

Outside in the parking lot, Max and Liz went into the van, while the other three climbed inside the motor home. Alex was behind the driver's wheel of the van, with Isabel next to him. "Okay, where to next?" Alex asked.

"Umm... the Adirondack state park in New York," Max muttered. "Or maybe Albany first - it's probably along the way."

"Albany?" Isabel asked. "I... I couldn't get much, once you were inside that room."

Max blinked in surprise and looked at Liz. He'd assumed that Isabel would be able to stay in touch. Did the Institute have some way of keeping aliens from using their powers to sense what was going on inside the building?

"Well, we'll try to explain as we go," Liz said. "First off, we talked to Shana - except her name's not really Shana, of course. She said to call her Christin, and she's working for Larek, at least, she is now. Got a bit cagey about that, said that she's a freelancer, but she's never worked for our enemies..."


	11. Chapter 11: Upstated

"Okay, so, what now?" Isabel said after Liz had explained a bit more. "Do we really need to head right out of town yet?" She sighed a little theatrically. "We've been just running and running for so long, and now we can kinda see the light at the end of the tunnel. Would it be so bad to... to grab an actual meal here in Scranton before leaving town?"

Max looked at Liz and Alex, and saw the hopeful looks on their faces. "Okay, umm, I'll call the others." He rang up Michael's cell phone. "Hey, I've got some tired and unhappy campers over here, and they want to go hit a sit-down joint before leaving town. How about you guys?"

Michael laughed slightly. "Sounds like a good idea to me, but let's not try to fit everybody into the same venue this time. We can pick one restaurant and you guys go to the other, and we each call in when we're done. Sound good?"

"Umm, alright," Max agreed. "Anybody.." But Michael had already cut the connection. "Oh well." He looked up. "Michael and the others are going to do the same, but go somewhere else... wherever we end up going."

"Hmm..." Isabel considered that. "Well, erm - how about, nah, nowhere really good here." She sighed. "No, nothing good on this street." She sighed. "Try turning right at the lights, honey." Liz had her nose pressed up against the window, but she didn't comment out loud.

Before they'd even gotten to the traffic intersection, a sign had appeared into view that probably caught the attention of all four teens. "Wranglers!" Max exclaimed with delight. If Michael was still behind them, and spotted that himself, he'd probably get upset that the other group got dibs. Then again, there probably wasn't any big shortage of barbecue places in town, even a few southern barbecue joints. The cheers of acclaim were unmistakeable, and Alex laughed as he pulled into the parking lot. "Whatcha gonna get, honey?" he asked Isabel.

"Not sure yet - I'll have to see their menu." The restaurant was loud and busy but not obviously packed, and a slightly frazzled waitress with long kinky brown hair led them to a booth table. "Hmm... chicken sounds good."

"Yeah... maybe I'll try the steak sandwich," Max mused aloud. They talked about food for a minutes, and then Max checked to make sure that nobody seemed to be listening to them. "Liz, Christin - she implied that she really put a lot of important stuff into that flash - stuff that she maybe couldn't say even over the Institute's communication link. Do you have any idea yet what that was?"

"Hmm, no, not really baby." Liz wrapped herself around Max's arm for a moment. "I... I'm remembering more of the trip - like picking Laurie up at the airport in Louisville, and you crashing into me on the stairs of that restaurant bridge." Max smiled slightly. "But, for whatever actually happened to me there in the museum, I still don't think I can remember anything." She thought. "Except maybe that Ava was involved. She... she seems important to me now, and I'm not sure why."

"Are... are you sure that it was Ava?" Isabel asked. "Not... not Tess? I'm just asing."

"No, definitely not Tess... or, at least not the same way," Liz said. "Their faces might be the same, but - but it was more about Ava's personality, her inner self, than the way she looks. There'd be no possible way of mistaking the two of them on that basis."

"I guess that you've got a point there," Alex admitted. "Maybe... maybe if this thing is so important, we could try slightly more extreme measures?"

"Like what?" Max asked, but Alex didn't reply, though he looked over at Isabel and blushed.

"You... you mean that Liz should try and fall asleep, and I go walking through her dream?" Isabel asked.

"Well, that's had impressive results in the past," Liz admitted. "And if I'm psychologically repressing what I saw or something, then it's probably down there in my subconscious, and a dream's as good a way of getting to it as anything else."

"Are - are you sure, Liz?" Isabel asked. "I mean... I've been using dreamwalking a few times as a communication tool since this trip started, but deliberately using it to violate your privacy..."

"It's not something you're doing to spy on me, just to help me figure this out," Liz insisted. "Like you're a dream doctor or something like that. If - if you don't want to do it, then that's okay. I - I just wanted to ask. And thank Alex for suggesting it."

"Well," Isabel said, and made a grumping sound. "We'll see - once dinner's over and so on."

"Okay," Liz agreed. "Um, so, let's see..."

"What do you think about Michael's theory," Max asked, and right then the waitress came to take everybody's food order.

"Sorry, umm, Michael's theory?" Isabel repeated once she was gone. "About how Larek sent a ship to carry all of us to safety?" She considered. "I... I certainly think it's possible. Maybe I even hope that that's it, just because it's the only thing I can think of that can actually save us." She sighed. "Though I'd be disappointed to really have to leave earth behind, and know that... that if I ever see Mom and Dad, it won't be for a long long time." She considered. "It kind of makes sense that _somebody_ sympathetic would have thought of sending us... a vessel of some sort, after the deal with the Granilith and Tess. Just didn't take much to guess, at that point, that Kivar might get pissed off enough to come to Earth with backup."

"I... I don't know how to feel about it," Alex blurted out. "I mean... Isabel, I love you a lot, of course, and the rest of you guys - you're the best friends I've ever had, and I don't know what I'd do without you... but on the other hand - I know what it was like for my parents when they thought I died. So soon after that, for me to just disappear off the face of the planet, so that they'd have to wonder if something happened to me again, but they wouldn't even know for sure..." He sighed. "I hate to put them through that."

"Yeah, well, on the other hand, that kinduv gives you a reason that you'd have to go," Max said slowly. "If he hasn't already, Kivar would probably find out about your supposed death, and wonder if there were alien allies of mine that were behind it. He'd investigate you, do anything he needed to to rule out that possibility - and he probably wouldn't believe that it was Ava and Rath who saved you and they were off on the ship with us." He groaned. "If you went back to Roswell he'd probably try to use your parents against you - torturing them in front of you or something like that."

"Okay, come on, Max," Isabel said severely. "No talk of the T word - we're getting ready to eat, for chrissakes."

"Sorry," Max mumbled, and sighed. "Okay, Liz - drill time. When we had breakfast in Jackson, what was the first thing you had to eat?"

Liz blinked, seeming to be completely at a loss for a second, and then she brightened. "Umm... a dutchie with lemon filling. I have no shame - but man, that sugar rush really did wake me up."

"Cool," Isabel said. "What did we use to make the pants I wore into the nightclub in Dallas?"

"Umm... two denim jackets - mine and Ava's," Liz replied.

"When we went to check the diner the first time, when Lonnie wasn't there, what..." Alex started

Liz grinned. "Somebody came up to us in the parking lot and tossed a sign onto the windshield of the van. The sign had a bible verse - Luke thirteen four I think, and a warning about the angels of Satan coming to the earth, which we all thought was a little bit too on the nose." She sighed. "This is fun, and it seems to be helping."

So they kept quizzing her until nobody could think of new questions, and around then their food and drinks arrived. Liz and Alex got off onto a nostalgic kick, talking about his Aunt Louise visiting before they started freshman year at the high school, and taking them and Maria down to Carlsbad caverns. "She said that we could all come out to California to visit her, and bring boyfriends and girlfriends, after we graduated," Liz remembered with a sigh. "Guess that's not going to..."

"Come on, Liz," Isabel put in. "Dwelling on it won't help."

"I dunno, it's kind of freeing to at least admit things out loud." Liz sighed. "What's the one big regret that you'll have if this is our last 24 hours on Earth?"

"Umm..." Isabel thought about that as she tore strips out of her chicken. "Probably... well, this is cliche, but I always wanted to see Paris."

"I get that," Alex admitted. "Frankly, it'd be kind of nice to actually make it to Sweden for real, but oh well.

About two thirds of the way through their main courses, Max's cell phone rang. He picked it up and checked the number - it was Roswell, and not anyone who was on the road trip with them. What was going on? Were some of the parents trying to track them down? They'd certainly been gone long enough for Alex's parents, or Liz's, to be getting agitated. But the number didn't seem to fit with either of them, and yet it was familiar. He picked it up on the third ring. "Who is this?"

"Evans, it's me, Brody." Max gasped slightly, recognizing the voice. "Umm, I can't really explain how, but I've got a message for you, and I think it's important. Where are you, anyway?"

"Umm, in a restaurant in Scranton," he said. "What's the message?"

"Umm... that K and his lackeys are heading northeast on a commercial airliner. Probably going to land somewhere in the tri-state area, but not sure." Max stifled a string of curses. They'd been taking too much for granted - he should have anticipated this. And the tri-state area - that was about as far north as Scranton was - and not much to the east of the Albany area. Kivar could come out well placed to race them to the end... and that was assuming he hadn't been able to catch a flight that would simply _land_ in Albany, potentially cutting them off.

And who could have given Brody this message? Max put that thought aside. "Thanks man. By the way, the lead for the Drazen institute paid off." And with that, he hung up. "Alright, we can take, umm, three or four minutes to eat as much as we can, and pay." As he spoke, Max was already checking in his wallet for enough money that they wouldn't get upset at the four of them taking off. "Kivar is coming by air - much closer than any of us want him to be."

"Ohmigawd, I'll call the others," Isabel said, getting out her own cell phone. So she made the call, and they ate a bit more, though nobody was quite able to clean their plates in time. Max just let money on the table without bothering to ask for the bill - he had been adding up as they ordered, and was good with the math in his head - it would work out to plenty, and a generous tip for the waitress in return for the slightly unconventional tactics. A tall, broad guy, maybe the acting manager, asked them if there was a problem on the way out, and Max blurted out something about having just heard that a friend was in the hospital. The manager waved someone over to the table to check on the money that Max had left, and then they were allowed to get on their way, with best wishes for the injured friend.

"I... I should maybe switch back to the motor home, as soon as we get a chance," Alex said as Max pulled the van out. "The laptop and cell card are there... I might be able to find out more about Kivar's flight from there - it's important information."

"Okay, yeah," Max agreed. "Isabel, Liz, do you still want to try the dreaming thing?"

"Oh, god, like I could fall asleep at a moment like this," Liz complained, and Isabel poked her, annoyed. "Well, I'll try. I guess this could be important too, yeah?"

"Definitely," Isabel said. "Umm... I'd like to have, let's see. Michael and Lonnie over here, in exchange for Alex. Lonnie might have useful info on this sort of thing, even if she's not so good at dreamwalking herself, and Michael... in Alex's absence, he's probably the one that I feel most comfortable with."

"Wait, are we going to do it here?" Liz asked. "Why... why don't we go back into the motor home?"

"Well, if it'll be much easier for you to fall asleep over there, I guess we can," Isabel replied. "I was just going for what looked like the simplest scenario."

"Umm... what do you think, Max?" Liz asked.

"I - umm, I think that you should go with whatever you're most comfortable with," Max told her. "I'll come with you guys to the motor home if you want, or stay here and keep driving."

"Okay, then, no question," Liz said. "We're all going back to the motor home." Alex chuckled slightly. "I hope people don't mind playing musical vehicles."

"There might be a little friendly grumbling," Max admitted. "But anything for the cause, I think that's appropriate in this case."

"Okay, my turn to call over I guess, and break the news," Alex said, picking up his cell phone. "Hi, Maria? Yeah, you're probably not going to believe this, but..."

#

In a little while, they'd finished the switch - Jim Valenti and Amy, Kyle and Laurie had all gone into the van. Maria was driving the motor home, with Rath keeping her company, Max and Liz were in the sleeping chamber, and Isabel was up in the alcove waiting for her dreamwalking powers to work on Liz. "Do... do you want to mess around, or would that be counterproductive?" Max teased his girl.

"Umm... I'm not sure," Liz admitted. "I do tend to, umm, to get sleepy after that, but it might just get awkward with Isabel waiting for us, and anyway it might take too long. Not that much of a drive to Albany." She sighed. "Maybe, actually, you could just give me a massage." She stretched out over the mattress. "I feel so tense, and I know you have good hands."

"Hmm... okay, twist my arm," Max said, crouching over Liz's legs, and using his powers to open up the back of her top where there hadn't been a seam before. He reached out and started to rub the small of her back. "How's this?"

"Okay, except you're being too gentle," she said with a soft giggle, so Max tried to push a little bit harder without going too far. "Yeah, hmm, that's nice. Now a little bit further up." Max considered, He could reach a bit further up just by leaning at an angle, but if she wanted him to go up more than that he'd have to change where he was crouching. Well, worry about that when the time came. "Oh, yeah, that's good, keep doing it like that."

"Maybe you should think of relaxing things," he suggested. "Like..."

"The crashing of waves, on the ocean beach?" Liz asked dreamily.

"Umm... I can't remember what I was going to say now, but yeah, that could work," he agreed. "Hey." Concentrating, he reached out, and connected to Liz. It wasn't hard to slow her breathing, relax all her voluntary muscles, and calm some of her higher mental processes. "How... how's that, Liz?"

"Hmm, mrfngrr," she mumbled, and Max took that as a cautious good sign. He kept rubbing her back, but in a few minutes it was clear that Liz was quite soundly asleep, and he got off of her and crawled a bit away so as to not risk disturbing her. He was actually a bit disappointed that he hadn't gotten a chance to move the back rub a bit higher and see if she'd object to him sitting on her butt. Oh well, another time - it could have been a bit awkward for him. Not really wanting to open the door, he just lay on the other side of the mattress and looked at Liz as she slept. He couldn't help but wonder what her sleep was like - if she was dreaming yet, and what Isabel thought of it. Max sighed.

He probably ended up drowsing a bit himself, though Max was never sure. A little while Liz rolled around a bit, shook herself, and mumbled, "Umm, little help putting myself back together here?"

"Hmm, what?" Max looked up. "Oh, right." Liz's shirt was still split wide open up her back, and that was clearly an awkward sensation for her. "Okay, come on, sit still and stop squrming or it's not going to go back together straight," he warned her. Actually, getting the fabric to rejoin exactly as it had been was no problem - Max had had a bunch of practice with this sort of thing. A few of the first times he'd tried it, the clothing didn't turn out to be nearly as strong as it originally was - prone to rip or tear at the same points that it had been split and then rejoined, but Max was pretty sure Liz wouldn't need to worry about that. "Do... do you think you've dreamed enough for Isabel?"

"Umm... I'm pretty sure I had a dream, and probably a significant one, though I can't remember the details." Liz sighed. "Let's go out and see what your sister thinks." So they emerged, and Isabel waved at them from the alcove up above the cab.

"Should I come down, or do you guys want to come up here?" she asked.

Max sighed. "You come down here," he said. He didn't really want to squeeze into that alcove with two other people again. So Isabel got down, and the three of them gathered around the kitchen table. Michael took Rath's place up front around now, and Rath and Ava went up into the alcove just so that the living room area wasn't too crowded.

"Alright, I got a bunch of imagery that I'm not sure if I can fit together, but it's certainly suggestive," Isabel told them with a sigh - or maybe she was mostly telling Liz - Max wasn't sure. "First off, the old pod chamber up in the Maideckezne rocks - and a bunch of people inside, crowded around the pods. Not sure how many people - three to five, at a guess. And one of them might have been Christin - she didn't look quite like the young Christin that you mentioned, but maybe she's got another, slightly more mature 'look'. Then, a whole bunch of faces... including your parents, Liz, looking younger than they are now, and somebody who I think, based on a picture you showed us once, would be your Grandma Claudia."

Liz jumped, slightly. "How many other faces, beyond those three?"

"Umm... three others - two men and a woman."

"Can... can you send me pictures, in flashes?" Liz asked, stretching out her hand. "I've got an idea... wondering if they're my two grandfathers and my other grandmother." Isabel shruged, reached out and touched Liz, briefly concentrating. "Yeah, that's them."

"But... but what does it all mean?" Max blurted out, and both girls looked at him. "A bunch of unfamiliar people - probably all aliens, in the pod chamber. We were still inside the pods I assume?"

"Yeah, as far as I could tell," Isabel said. "It was hard to see anything at all inside them, but there wasn't any of the, umm, messy stuff left over from when we broke out."

"And then Liz's parents and grandparents?" Max said. "What... what's the connection?"

"I dunno, sweetie," Liz said, patting his arm. "Was there anything else, Isabel? I guess this wasn't one of the kind of dreams with an actual narrative structure and random weirdness like talking to gophers."

Isabel laughed. "No, it doesn't seem so. Do you often talk to gophers in your dreams?"

"Umm... I'm not sure," Liz admitted. "Vividly remember one like that from a little while ago, though." She sighed.

"And yes, there was some more, though, umm..." She seemed to be deep in thought. "Something kind of weird. Two, umm, two bubbles meeting, touching - and joining into one larger one."

"That could be, umm, not related to the Christin flash," Liz mumbled. "Just, err, a sexual metaphor - or a romantic one, I suppose." She considered it. "Pregnancy fears?"

Max jumped slightly, and she turned to look at him. "Sorry," he said, and Liz nodded. "But if it was about pregancy, or conception - Isabel, were the two bubbles the same size?"

"Not quite."

"Hmm, yeah," Liz said after a moment. "For conception, I guess I'd expect them to either be _very_ close in size, or _very_ different - since I know that an egg is much larger than a sperm cell." She sighed. "Of course, if it was symbolically romantic, then that might fit." She sighed. "I mean, you're a bit bigger than me, Max, but not very much."

"Actually, it looks like quite a bit different when you're both standing up," Isabel teased. "But I won't presume to dictate interpretations, especially since these might have come from your own subconscious impressions, Liz." Isabel sighed. "Let's see... that's three images or image sequences... what else? Oh, right - a bunch of little kids playing musical chairs."

"Really?" Liz asked. "Where were they?"

"Umm, it was just like a cartoon, against a blue background or something," Isabel said. "Cute four or five year old kids running around between big wooden chairs." She laughed slightly. "And, umm, and one more that might have been from somewhere else in your subconscious, other than the flash from Christin. You getting dressed for a wedding, Liz." This time, even after Liz shot Max a look, he remained calm.

"So, I was seeing myself in the dream?" Liz asked.

"I... I'm not sure," Isabel admitted. "Maybe... yeah, I think there was a mirror, so maybe it was your own point of view, but looking into the mirror." She looked at Liz. "You looked gorgeous, I have to admit - white dress that was a little bit fancy, and kinduv sexy all at the same time." Liz giggled. "With a necklace or a pendant hanging down into your, umm, down the front of your dress, and a tiara in your hair."

"Hmmm..." Liz thought about that. "Not really how I always pictured my wedding day." She shot one more look at Max, speculatively, and seemed to be debating whether or not to say something for a long moment. "In fact, with the tiara... it's almost as if I was picturing myself as a _royal_ bride."

"You mean, like we were getting married on an alien world or something?" Max asked, and Liz nodded. "Well, considering all the talk of leaving Earth, I guess that's understandable. When we get to some other place - I don't know exactly how they'll react and how closely they'll identify me with King Zan, but there'll probably be some royal ceremony if I want to get married."

"Yeah," Isabel agreed. "Did either Michael or I tell you about the pledge pendants, Liz?"

"Umm... I don't think so," Liz said. "What are..."

"It's something cultural I picked up when we were on Stellynfrus," Isabel answered. "I... I noticed after a little while that the colony leader, Gird - that he always wore two necklaces, usually going down under his tunic. He wasn't the only one around there who did, either. When I asked him about it, it turns out that it's kind of a comparable tradition to the way that we use rings. Two lovers will exchange necklaces, and each wear the other's, when they are betrothed or promised to each other, and a second pair when the bonding or matromonial vows are enacted. There's a whole line of symbolism about it that I quite liked, how the necklace represents the circle of emotion, leading its way around the head, and drawing emotion close to the heart."

Liz grinned. "Yeah, I guess I kinda like that too. But I'm pretty sure that I've never heard it before - so if the necklace in my dream was supposed to be a pledge pendant or whatever, then it must've come from Christin's flash I think." She hmmmed for a long moment. "I actually think that all of this came from there, though we're probably missing bits that represent the connection." She sighed. "Alex, man, how's it going with the flight tracking?"

"Umm... not so good news," Alex replied. "As nearly as I can make out, Kivar and four of his people either landed at Newark within the past fifteen minutes, or they're just doing so now."

"Oh boy," Max muttered. He wasn't sure where Newark was in connection with them, but that didn't sound particularly good. "Maybe we should start ignoring the speed limits except for where it looks like there's speed patrols."

"Don't go into panic mode quite yet," Isabel suggested. "He'll probably be tied up some before he can just drive away from the airport."

"I dunno," Liz said. "Sounds like his crew is starting to get the hang of things on Earth. And they're powerful enough to take shortcuts... just go into the parking lot, find a car that's big enough and steal it. Hotwiring wouldn't be any problem for somebody with alien powers. Nobody could really stop them." She sighed. "And they're certainly not going to worry about the speed limit - or highway patrols - if it means catching us."

"Alright," Isabel agreed, sighing. "I'll tell Michael to hit warp nine." And she reached out to touch the intercom button.

The next ten minutes or so were pretty uncomfortable, as Maria got the hang of driving the motorhome at seventy-five miles per hour or more, which was no small feat, especially since the highway was crowded enough that she had to deal with another car in her lane that wasn't going so fast every so often - which required either a quick sideways course correction, or a last-resort braking maneuver. Eventually Rath insisted on taking over the wheel, and he managed to prove that he could deal with going eight much more smoothly than Maria could handle seventy-five. The van was having fewer problems, and was soon driving ahead of them and helping to scout out or clear a path.

"Oh, right," Liz said a few minutes after Rath had started driving, reaching into the pocket of her jacket, hung up near the door of the motor home. She pulled something out, took it back to the kitchen table, unwrapped some plastic, and began to nibble on the brown stuff underneath. Max chuckled. "What?"

"Oh, just - I didn't even notice that you doggie-bagged your riblets," he pointed out. The boneless delicacies seemed to be wrapped up in a sheet of plastic cling-wrap.

"Yeah, well." Liz shrugged. "I didn't think that anyone from the restaurant would mind, since we had to leave too quickly for them to wrap anything up for us." She sighed. "Have you got a problem with it?"

"Oh, me? No, of course not," Max assured her. "I'm a little curious why you brought the plastic wrap into the restaurant in the first place."

"Hmm." Liz peered closely at the clear material, as if expecting the answer to be there. "You - you know, I'm actually not sure! I... I was thinking that it would be a shame to leave any of the meat behind, and... and I put my hand into the jacket pocket, and there it was. I - I didn't think about it any more at the time. I certainly didn't put it into my jacket just before we left the van to go eat."

"Hmm indeed," Max said, and Liz laughed a bit. "I... I suppose it could have something to do with your mysteriously emerging alien powers, like a bunch of other subtle things. You could probably have turned... I dunno, a bit of material from the jacket lining or something, and turned it into plastic. That stuff is synthetic - it probably has all the same molecules. Just turning one kind of artificial hydrocarbon into another."

"Hmm." Liz reached out a hand, and the jacket flew away from its hook and into it. "Let's see now." Ignoring Max's frankly amazed stare, she opened up the jacket and started looking at the lining. "Well, no holes in the lining... there's a big patch here where it seems thin, but that **might** just be from ordinary wear. Nothing conclusive."

"Well, except for the way you moved the jacket telekinetically," Max pointed out. "That might not say anything directly about the cling wrap, but it's definitely conclusive about _something_!"

"I... I did?" Liz asked, looking confused.

"How else do you think it got here?" Max asked, as nonconfrontationally as he could. "You didn't get up. You just reached out your hand, and the jacket flew over to it."

Liz still looked doubtful. "You didn't do it yourself?" she asked, and Max shook his head. "Um, Ava? Isabel?"

"Nope, wasn't me girl," Ava said from up in the alcove. "In fact, I caught a brief glimpse of the power, and it came from inside you, Liz. I **told** you that you'd be changing."

"Huh," Liz muttered, still staring at the jacket as if unable to quite believe it. "Well, I guess if there was ever a time where we needed someone else with alien powers... with Kivar and his lackeys chasing us, this is probably it."

Nobody replied to that.

#

"Okay, coming up on Albany," Lonnie said, coming back from the cab. "Are we pulling off here, or just heading on through?"

"We keep on, unless we get or see some kind of sign from Christin," Max decided. "No way of telling how close Kivar is behind us." He sighed. "Head for the park by the quickest route, and then, I don't know, keep driving through it. Dammit, she should have told us more."

"Maybe... maybe one of us should try going back to sleep," Liz said uncertainly. "She might try dreamwalking as a communication method."

"Hmm... I suppose that's worth a try," Max agreed, sighing. "Anybody have a New york map? Just what _is_ the quickest way from Albany into the Adirondack park?"

"I'm on it," Alex said, clicking and typing on the laptop. Max couldn't tell offhand if he was in Streets and Trips, or had gone online with the cellular modem to Mapquest, but figured that Alex knew what was best. "I think northwest is the best way to go, actually... the I-90 northwest through Schenectady and then the route 8 north, once we get to Amsterdam." The border of the park comes furthest south there, so I think it's less distance to cover than going straight north."

"Okay," Liz agreed.

"Wait a second, how close are Schenectady and Albany?" Isabel asked curiously.

"Umm... real close - maybe 20 miles," Alex replied after a moment. "Maybe 25 minutes... I guess we can time it and see."

"Huh," Isabel replied. "I never thought that they were that close... though I never really thought much about the geography of upstate New York I guess." She sighed. "Would have been nice to be able to spend a bit more time on a road trip through here, instead of having to zip along because the Renegades of Antar are at our heels. Oh well, bygones."

"Yeah," Lonnie agreed. "Oh well, on the other hand, there'll be other lands that you can explore when we get out there, back to the Antarian sector of space. Of course, it probably won't be safe to go back to Antar for a little while, but I've heard bunches of good stuff about all kinds of planets around there. If we go back to the Sanctuary and meet up with Grandma Queenie and Tess, well... I'm pretty sure that the Sanctuary is on Vrelayan, which is known for the pretty hill country of Landorin. On the other hand, if Larek is calling the shot, maybe we'll be off for Rahlicx and get to see the Crystal seas of Merenditzh."

"Wait a second, back up a moment," Max said. "Do Kivar's people know that, about the Sanctuary?"

"What do you think?" Lonnie joked. "Actually, I think that they suspect a few places, but there are reasons that he's not able to call the navy in and find the Rebels there, political and practical reasons. Kivar's a very practical guy. Anyway, I have sources of information that he doesn't have."

"And did it ever occur to you to give him access to that information?" Isabel said coldly. "Like, if the price was right enough?"

Lonnie shrugged. "Maybe. I never went looking for one of his crew. And now - it's a wash. I'm not going to go flipping on you now - I may be slick and slippery, but once I give my word, I stick to it. And I'm sitting fairly pretty, as long as you don't change your mind and keep me from getting on board the ship, which I don't think you would."

"No... I don't think we will," Liz said, only a little grudgingly.

Max, for his own part, took a long time to revise everything that Lonnie had said to him, that first time, when she was trying to control him before and during the Summit meeting, and if she had ever broken a promise. "You... you don't tend to make many promises, do you, Lonnie?"

She turned to face him, slightly surprised. "No. And I guess that should tell you that I do take them seriously, that I don't go back on my word. If I did, I'd promise people more - at least, when it counted, because it still wouldn't pay to let people realize that they couldn't trust me to keep up my end of a bargain too early. But... well, I don't like to close down my options, so I generally stay away from giving my word away for real. When I do, though, you can stand by it."

Max thought about it and decided that Lonnie probably meant that. She hadn't hesitated to manipulate him, to lie, to deceive him by pretending to be Isabel, to play on his emotions by invoking the suffering of his alien people, and eventually to attempt to kill him, doing Nicholas' dirty work for him, but nevertheless she lived by a code of honor. It was just that all of those other things weren't offenses against her sense of honor, but breaking her vow would be. "And would you promise to not tell Kivar anything that would work in his favor, that he could use against his enemies, against people who might possibly be friendly to us, or who we might care for in any way?" Max asked. "I'm not sure that that's covered by what you told me back at the diner. You said best behaviour, and agreed to not selling _us_ out, and to treating everyone here decently. But you probably interpret that very narrowly - telling Kivar the location of Sanctuary wouldn't be directly selling me out, especially if I'm not going to Sanctuary straight away."

Lonnie thought about that, and looked hard at him. "You're starting to get clever, Max. You're right, that wasn't covered, but I'll agree to it. No helping Kivar against the Royalist rebels, or against any of the other planets, or in anything that isnt clearly a noble and altruistic pursuit really. No making deals with him except as under the above. No leaking info to him that's privileged by others. How's that?"

"It'll do I think," Max said, and both of them smiled at the same time. "So, umm... anybody want munchies? We've still got some snack foods squirrlled away behind the couch I think."

"Yeah for food," Isabel agreed. "I've been eating so much for being nervous... oh well." She stopped with a bag of barbecue potato chips in her hands, not opening it. "Hey, I wonder what food on a spaceship would be like."

"Ehh, probably not bad." Lonnie said. "They've got fancy high-tech devices to synthesize perfectly nutritious foods with whatever tastes and textures you want, I think." She smirked a little and helped herself to some caramel chews. "Of course, if you start to think about what raw material they've got available for feeding into the food synthesizers, well... it can be a bit hard to keep up your appetite."

"Ewww," Liz groaned.

Max just took some pretzels and shrugged. He wasn't that picky about eating food that came out of waste products, as long as the process was hygenic enough. After all, that was essentially how the Earth's biosphere worked... raw materials from animal elimination, dead animals and plants were converted through solar energy and specialized living cells into grains, fruits, meats and just about anything else they ate. It just probably took longer in a biosphere than in an Antarian waste processer/food synthesizer unit.

"Hmm," Alex mused, taking some of the chips from Isabel's bag. "Will we get to see out the portholes I wonder? Will there be any good views?"

"Probably nothing much will ever change, as long as the ship is in normal space," Lonnie put in. "Any serious distances get covered at several times the speed of light, in warp space, and I have to admit, I'm not sure what that's like." She sighed. "You went through warp space, Isabel, but you were in the Granilith, and it'd probably be different in a conventional spaceship."

"Yeah, I'd imagine," Isabel agreed. "Inside the granilith, well, our bodies seemed to be part of the thing as long as it _wasn't_ at warp speed, or whatever. When it was, then we found ourselves in a little, vaguely cone-shaped room, and there was shifting whiteness and vague pastel colors outside." She dusted her hands off on a paper napkin that had been sitting on the coffee table and picked up the laptop. "Is this online? I want to check the news reports for back in Roswell, just to make sure that there isn't..." She clicked a few buttons and looked at Alex. "Did... did you punch this in?"

"Umm... no, I don't think so, but maybe I'm not sure," he admitted, slightly wonderstruck. Max hurried over, but all he could see was that there was an open notepad window with a bit of text in it.

"What does it say?" he asked urgently.

"Childwold," Isabel read. "Dirt track north eight miles. Ten pm, eastern daylight time. Try not to be late. C."

"Then... then I think that we've got our message from Christin," Max muttered, "though I still wish she'd stop being so mysterious and cryptic."

"But what the heck is a childwold?" Isabel complained.

"It's a place," Alex explained. "A... a little town inside the park borders, northwest edge I think." He was moving quickly to some sort of computerized map. "Well, not that close to the edge, but certainly that part of the park." He whistled. "If we're going to get there, and then go eight miles down a dirt track, for ten pm, then we'd better keep moving fast. We won't be able to maintain this speed once we're inside the park, but still..."

"There are towns inside the park?" Liz asked.

"Yeah, I think that they had already been founded when the park was declared," Max replied. "They can't grow beyond the town limits, already settled farms or whatever, but nobody made them get out." He sighed slightly. "And onward we go."

"I guess it's better that they're expecting us close to the limit of when we'll be able to arrive," Isabel said dubiously. "Less chance that Kivar's going to be able to interfere. But... but how did she send that message? Did she make Alex type it out without realizing that he'd done it?"

"Either that, or some very fancy manipulation of the computer circuitry at long distance," Alex said uncertainly. "You couldn't really do it with traditional internet communication... well, just _maybe_ possibly with really fancy hacking techniques. And it'd be much easier just to find out what our messenger screen name was, and send the message that way, if it came over the computer."

"Okay," Liz sighed. "I'm going to lie down for a bit - don't think I can sleep, but I need to rest." And she went back into the sleeping chamber. Max tried to figure out if he should follow her, and went ahead, hoping that she wouldn't mind.

Liz hugged him fiercely before the door had even finished closing. "I... I'm scared," she admitted.

"I'm a little frightened myself," Max admitted. "Not sure if it's more of Kivar catching up and attacking us, or the thought of leaving, or - or that Christin and whoever else is up here in the woods might not actually want to help us."

"Yeah, we're stuck between a rock, a hard place, and some kind of unpleasant third thing," Liz agreed, and lay down, her arms still around Max, and his about her. "Just hold me like this, and tell me that no matter what, you'll never forget me."

"I love you," Max whispered. "I don't know what else is going to happen tonight, if someone may try to kill us... but you can count on my love." Liz seemed to consider this for a moment, then paused.

"No matter what, I'm yours," Liz insisted. "And I don't intend to let anything seperate us."


	12. Chapter 12: Running in Circles

"Uh-oh!" The exclamation seemed to electrify Max's nerves, and he hurried towards the cab. Unfortunately, Alex got to the door leading that way at about the same time, and there was a brief delay while they tried to figure out who should go first.

"What... what's wrong?" Max asked, hurrying in. Already he could tell that something seemed to be wrong with the way the motor home was handling... a lack of energy, a particular kind of unresponsiveness. Soon Rath had started to pull over to the edge of the road - a maneuver that he only just managed before the vehicle's engine died entirely. "What happened? It... it was if we were running on..."

"On fumes, yeah," Rath replied. "I... I just checked the gas gauge a few moments ago, and... and it was okay, maybe a little bit on the low side, but..." He growled. "Someone had better go and check the bottom of the tank."

"Yeah," Max said, hurrying out. "Someone call the van." As he rushed out the side door of the RV, he could tell that that probably wasn't necessary - someone in the van must have noticed that they were having problems, because the vehicle was in the middle of a three-point turn a little ways down the road. Max oriented on the gas tank and rolled himself halfway under the motor home and groaned loudly. Something - maybe a big chunk of gravel, had somehow managed to tear a noticeably big hole in the bottom of the tank. It was as freaky a thing as Max had ever seen, but presumably an honest accident, not freaky alien sabotage. Such a gap could probably have dumped out quite a bit of gas out on the road in a reasonably short time.

"Is it breached?" Rath called from next to Max's legs.

"Yeah, pretty badly, but I think I can fix it," Max said, concentrating. He 'pulled' a bit of metal away from the edge of the frame of the motor home to help in the repairs he was making - ensuring that the tank was tight was much more important than anything else. After about a minute, he was fairly satisfied. "Okay, that's fixed the hole, but..."

"But we're outta juice," Michael added grimly. Max pulled himself out from under and stood up. "Well, except for what we've got in the van, and that's none too much."

The van had pulled up by now, and apparently somebody had told them about the problem. "Well, there's probably enough to get both vehicles to the next town, if not more," Jim put in. "We'd probably have had to gas the van up once more before getting where we were going anyway."

"But... but how do we share it out?" Maria asked. "We... I guess we could try that stuff with sucking it up through a hose, and... and I'm not sure what then. Having to use a mint afterwards to get the gasoline taste out of your mouth."

"You... you kinda need to know what you're doing with that, I think," Isabel put in. "Or you could get really sick, if you accidentally swallow the gas or breathe it in."

"Like anybody would do that," Rath snorted.

"How about this?" Michael suggested, and he jumped into the van for a moment, to try and line its gas tank as closely to the motor home's as possible, though this was complicated by the occasional traffic coming down the road and the thick forested grown on the other side of the highway shoulder. Getting out, he unscrewed both caps, and concentrated. A swirling stream of liquid gasoline came out of the van, flew through the air - and sprayed against the side of the rv and under it. "Okay, that didn't work."

"Don't try that again, Michael," Maria said. "We don't have much gas to waste with stunts like that."

"Alright, but come on." Michael sighed. "I thought it would work... and would look really cool, too." He sighed. "We can probably make a hose if we've got something big enough that's made out of plastic."

"Yeah, but we could still lose gas that way," Liz pointed out. "And I think some cars have guards against that sort of thing."

"Not a van this old," Rath argued.

"Okay, come on, let's do the simple thing," Max suggested. "Five or six of us go back to the gas station we passed five or ten minutes ago, in the van. Get plenty of gas for the motor home - and a fill-up for ourselves too."

A few glances were exchanged - actually, it was probably more than twenty, though that wasn't nearly enough for everybody in a group that large to glance at everybody else. "Okay," Maria agreed. "Who goes and who stays?"

"At least three aliens stay," Michael suggested, "and two go."

"I'll go with the van this time," Max suggested. "And Rath is with me. And Mister Valenti, Kyle, and... and Maria. Everybody else stays put here. Sound good?" Nobody objected, and Max got into the back of the van. Valenti took the wheel. "I just hope that we don't lose too much time this way."

"We should be okay. This was the only way to do it," Kyle reassured Max. "And Liz'll be fine." Max looked at Kyle and sighed slightly.

#

It did take them ten minutes, if not a bit more, to get to the gas station, and Kyle started filling up the van while Kyle and Maria went inside to see about if they could buy some cans, or get cans to put gas that they'd pay for in. Max and Rath looked around, keeping watch, and Max caught a glimpse of something that seemed weird. A woman had come around the edge of a building nearby, started walking down the street, caught sight of the group - and suddenly turned back around the way she'd come, heading for cover. Max looked over at Rath - he'd seen it too. "What do you think that was about?"

"Umm... I don't know," Rath admitted. "Doesn't really seem like what an enemy would do if they caught us. But it was damn weird, any maybe we shouldn't ign-"

That was about as much as Max heard, before he started chasing down the street to catch the woman. She hadn't been expecting pursuit, and didn't quicken her pace even when Max was loudly running toward her, from not far away. "Um, excuse me," he panted, drawing near, and the woman turned around. She was attractive in a mature way, forty-something, and she didn't seem to recognize **him** particularly. "I... I'm sorry to bother you, ma'am, I just... well, it kind of seemed like you were avoiding me and my friends, and I was curious as to why."

"I... I don't see that I need to answer any question like that, punk," she replied.

Max stifled a laugh, thinking that if she was calling him a punk, what would she have thought of Zan, or of Rath in his full New York regalia? "No, I guess you don't."

The woman sighed, perhaps regretting what she'd called him. "But... but if you must know, I just didn't expect to see my ex-husband and my son here."

"_What_?" Max exclaimed. But... but that made a very strange kind of sense. "You're... you're Kyle Valenti's mother?"

"Yes," she said, nodding slightly. "Michelle Patrick, once upon a time Michelle Valenti. And if you're about to try persuading me to go and say hello to him, well..."

"No, no, that's okay," Max insisted. If the circumstances had been different, Max might have indeed tried to set up that reunion - he knew that Kyle had always been disappointed by the fact that his mother had left his life... and possibly the fact that Kyle would be upset or embarassed at an unexpected reunion would have counted as a plus in Max's books. But there definitely wasn't time for this, especially if Michelle wasn't interested. "I... I thought that maybe you were someone else. Really sorry."

"That's okay," she said. "Are you one of Kyle's friends?"

"Umm, kind of," Max allowed. "For a long time we were more like rivals than acquaintances, but - well, yeah, I think we're pretty much friends now. Not the best of friends, but..."

"I see." And without another word, Michelle Patrick turned and walked away. Max jogged back to within sight of the gas station and gave Rath a thumbs up. Rath waved, and then made a gesture like Max should look around up there anyway - maybe he misunderstood, and thought there was still some reason to be worried about Skins laying an ambush. Max sighed, looked around, and spotted the name and description of a nearby storefront. For a second he resisted the impulse to go inside, but wasn't able to stop himself for long. There'd be time, if he didn't let himself hesitate in indecision.

By the time Max had left the pawn shop with his purchase the van was already filled up, but they were still working on filling up cans for the motor home. These had been provided fairly cheap by the gas station proprietor, (after a fair bit of 'eyelash batting' by Maria, the way Kyle told the story,) and a plastic funnel contraption thrown in for free. "It wasn't anybody to worry about," Max told to Rath as they got in.

"Alright, good enough," Rath said. "I think we should probably only put a bit of gas into the tank first... just to be on the safe side. I mean, not to doubt your craftsmanship, but..."

"We put in at least half," Max said. "We can't afford to spend the time worrying about it." He sighed. "It'll be fine."

And it was right then that a bolt of energy whizzed through the air outside the van, heading right for them. Max threw out his hand to erect a shield completely by instinct. "Dammit!" Rath muttered. "What the heck's going on?"

"I... I don't know," Max muttered, diving for the van door and cautiously taking a look out.

"If that's Kivar and his entire hand-picked squad," Rath muttered, but Max ssshed him. He **knew** what it meant if that was the entire squad. They couldn't overcome a force like that with just the two of them, and... and what would happen if Max led them back to the others waiting at the still-immobile motor home? There were way too many possibilities for someone to get hurt. Suddenly brave to the point of foolishness, Max threw himself out of the van, looking in the direction that the attack had come. He could somehow tell that Rath was opening one of the van windows a crack and looking for his own moment - yeah, that would hopefully work. Max would draw fire, and Rath could lower the boom. Assuming it was only one shooter.

It seemed to be. Partially hidden by a fancy sports car parked on the other side of the street from the gas station, a dark-haired man, possibly thirty-something, pointed and shot another burst red-orange power straight at Max. Just as it approached, Max's shield winked out - apparently he couldn't maintain it and concentrate on where he was going. Rather than try to re-establish it in time to save himself, Max focused on the charge and managed to safely deflect it above him, crashing into some kind of old shed on the edge of the gas station lot, collapsing it. Great.

The skin with the porsche, (Max thought it was a Porsche,) swore something that was garbled into unintelligibility by the wind, (or had started out in an alien language that Max didn't know,) and focused again. Suddenly Max knew that he was about to face a rock crusher - some sort of attack that he couldn't deflect, and quite possibly, if there was one, something that he couldn't even shield against. A particle blast or something like that. He had one trick left up his sleeve, and that was it. If it didn't work, he was toast. He waited while the shooter took his aim - and dodged to the side. Something created a horrible pain in his leg, and then... and then he was lying amidst some gravel and loose straw, and there were sounds that he didn't quite follow. He tried to turn to see what had happened to the shooter, but... but he couldn't orient himself, and his calf didn't feel at all right. Then... "Oh, god, Max? Are... are you all right?"

"My... my leg's hurt, and... and I'm still in a lot of pain," he managed to mutter. "Did Rath get him?"

"Oh, yeah." After a moment, Rath and Kyle came - carried Max into the van, though he complained a bit, not very effectively since he wasn't at all sure about trying to limp over the distance himself, that he had dived across with such abandon just a minute or two earlier. They stretched him out over the back seat, where he could smell the cans of gasoline, and hope that they weren't leaking. "What... what happened to the guy? Was... was he alone?"

"Yeah, I think he was alone," Rath confirmed. "One agent who followed the trail north from Nashville instead of south with Kivar, who stayed on our ass the whole time and finally caught up when we turned back." He sighed. "That car of his must have helped - probably stole it from somebody early on." A pause. "And yeah, I got him - blue laser just as he particle blasted you, Evans. Skins are usually on the ball enough to use mirror reflection shields against laser light, but this one had other things on his mind. Nice tumble, man, but you weren't quite quick enough to dodge that particle blast."

"Umm, yeah," Max mumbled. "Just check to make sure that there isn't anybody behind us - and get us back to the motorhome quick. Kivar's real guys aren't going to be far behind. And they..." He didn't have enough energy or concentration to finish the sentence, but it didn't seem to matter. Everybody knew.

Max probably passed out during the drive. Certainly he wasn't aware of anything, even of pain really, for a while, and then he realized that someone was holding his hand. He looked up and saw Liz crouching next to the middle seat of the van, looking back at him. They were still moving - no, if Liz was here, it had to be that they were moving _again_, because she couldn't exactly have come in while the van was at speed. Things didn't really work that way. "How... how are you doing?"

"Better now that you're here," Max said, but the wince of pain somewhat ruined the effect of his sweet remark.

"Well, maybe... maybe you should try to heal yourself," Liz said. "It might be hard to concentrate sufficiently, but it'll help you later on." She sighed. "To be brutally honest, things were hairy enough even before you got yourself shot, and we can't afford to keep you out of action."

Max hesitated, and then nodded. "I... I'll need your help, though, I think."

"Umm... why? I mean, err - how?"

He laughed slightly. "Just... just stay here with me." Max reached down and used his powers to cut away the fabric of the pants around his calf. The blasted would was very evident, and Liz gasped in shock, but she remembered to reach out and squeeze Max's shoulder supportively when he slipped his hand away from hers. "Here we go," Max said, shuddering with pain and distaste. "Just... just lend me what strength you can." Liz nodded, her eyes wide.

Max concentrated and probed into the state of health of his leg. There was, as he'd more or less expected, good news and bad news. The bad news was that the 'blast' was terribly effective at what it did - a narrow column of flesh reaching nearly all the way through had been struck, killing nearly all living cells in its path. The good news, or at least noticeably less bad, was that the major nerve and vein running through the leg had been missed, and the primary artery had been just 'nicked' and seemed to still be functioning at around 95%. He had lost skin cells, muscle, connective tissue, and a bit of bone marrow, but nothing more critical. Also, there seemed to be very little radioactivity or unstable isotopes spreading through his body, which he'd been worried about - maybe a trace that would contribute to his weakness in the short term, but nothing that seemed to be threatening in the long term.

Okay, he had to prioritize, because he didn't have much strength to do more than look - even staying connected to himself in this way was draining, and Liz could only offer so much support in his weakened state. Firstly, he did what he could to 'clean up the mess' from the dead flesh along the path of the blast - left to itself, those ruined cells would release unhealthy byproducts into Max's bloodstream that would make him even sicker in two hours or so. He did what he could to remove those byproducts from his system entirely, or convert them into other substances that wouldn't be as harmful, but he didn't have enough effort to deal with all of it. Then, the muscle. He might very well need to stand on this leg before the night was out. He could not heal the muscle that had been struck, but other muscle cells nearby would eventually duplicate and move in to replace them. Max sped up that process as much as he could- and then the connection broke, leaving him panting and unsuccessfully fighting back tears of pain, exhaustion, and frustration. Before he knew what was happening, Liz had crawled forward, and was wrapping him in a tight, reassuring embrace. "Oh, baby," she whispered. "It... it'll be okay. I'll make sure of that somehow."

Max smiled weakly. "You... you should get back into your seat and buckle in. I'll be okay back here."

"Hmm..." Liz drew back and Max stared into her face. He wasn't quite sure what to make of her expression - obviously, she could see the sense in his suggestion, but she didn't want to leave him alone, even if they could still speak to each other - she wanted to be able to see him, to reach out and touch him. "Justa sec." She gestured with her hands, and Isabel appeared from around the edge of the van's middle seat. Liz whispered something in Isabel's ear that Max couldn't hear, and Isabel giggled, and the two girls seemed to be rearranging so that they were as far away from that seat as possible. Then Isabel raised a hand, using her powers... on the car seat, and part of it flipped around and shifted... and Max gaped.

She had rearranged the seat so that it faced backwards, towards his own, rather than into the front of the vehicle. Max had to grin - it was an out of the box answer to the problem, but relatively simple given the use of her powers, and he would definitely enjoy the company at a time like this. Liz took the far side of the seat, meaning that she was closer to his feet than the rest of him, but she was still close enough to reach out and touch him, and that seemed good. "Okay, so... have we made it into the park yet?"

"Not quite, but soon," Isabel said. "Don't worry yourself about that any more than you have to. And before you ask, the motor home is okay - right behind us." She gestured past Max, and he realized that she could see over his seat and out the back window of the van.

"I'll try... it's hard not to obsess," Max admitted. "Feel like I could have done better against that enemy agent, but everything just happened so fast." He sighed. "And... and even though he was trying to kill or capture us, I still feel weird about the idea that he's dead."

"Yeah, I know," Liz said softly. "But... but that's how it goes sometimes, I think. If Kivar's declared war against you, then the soldiers loyal to him - their lives are an extension of his will. You have to resist them with every bit of force you can muster up, if you aren't content to submit to Kivar's power - which I don't think you're about to."

"No, I'm not," Max confirmed. "And... and I think I understand all of what you've said. But while I can convince my head, my heart isn't so sure. It bleeds for those poor guys, caught between our righteous indignation, and the wrath that Kivar surely reserves for traitors and deserters of his cause."

"War is hell," Isabel summarized succintly.

"Something's bugging me," Max muttered, and thought a second, as hard as he could through the slightly dizzy spells, until he had it. "Shouldn't... should the motor home be ahead of us, and we in the van bringing up the rear?"

The girls paused for a second, looking at each other. "Umm, why?" Liz asked him.

Max struggled to sit up. "Because.. because if there's danger, it'll come from behind. The motor home has a big blind spot, because nobody can really see through the living section behind it. In the van, you can look out the back window, you might even be able to fight through it. The motorhome doesn't have that ability."

"Oh," Isabel realized. "Yeah, I'll call in."

"Alright." Max smiled slightly, and lay back down, but pointing himself the other way on the back seat, so that his feet were towards the right side of the vehicle, nearer the door, and his head was right opposite Liz. She smiled at him, and he smiled back - and promptly fell asleep again.

#

Max looked around, blinked, and smiled. His mind must have retreated into dreams as an escape from the pain, and that was just fine by him, for the moment. He was standing on the beach back at Corpus Christi, except that the sands and the sidewalks that had always been incredibly crowded, in the real town, were so absolutely empty that it was eerie - but then, dreams were generally good at eerie. Seabirds wheeled in the sky - some kind of gulls or something (Max wasn't good at seabirds,) and a dog barked somewhere in the distance, but he couldn't see any other people aside from himself and Liz. They were both in bathing suits - Max in a pair of fairly baggy shorts, and Liz in her 'Baywatch red' that some of the others had teased her about when they went to the beach. Of course, Max thought it looked really hot on her, so he wasn't complaining.

"Well, what are we waiting for?" Liz asked, and she quickly nestled up to kiss him, and then dashed away for the breaking waves. Max laughed half of a laugh, and rushed out to race her - he had longer legs and more practice with running... (he'd never been that athletic, but had always made a point of keeping in shape and once had even tried out for the West Roswell High track team, in freshman year, before he really met Liz.) He passed her just as they splashed into the very edge of the ocean, and turned around so that she would run into his open arms. Which she did, and between that and the unsteadiness of moving water around his ankles and wet sand under his feet, they both lost their balance and splashed much more thoroughly into the shallow water. Max kissed Liz back, and stroked her face and her neck, loving this. It occured to a small part of his brain that he would never have been able to do that in real life - to run on his injured leg, but there was no trace of it in the dream.

Liz led him out further, to water that was up to her shoulders and Max's mid-chest, and then further, so that they were alternating between treading water and doing lazy side strokes, floating amid the waves, which seemed calmer out here, away from the very edge of land. "I... I can't believe that we're together like this," she said, "after everything that we've both been through."

Max thought about it. "Well, someone pedantic might say that we're not really together like **this**," he argued, splashing a bit of water toward her, not directly into her face, but some of the edge of the splash landed on her shoulder and her neck.

"Are you trying to be all cryptic and mysterious on me, just because we're in a dream?" Liz asked. Max jumped slightly. It was something so exactly like what Liz would say if she had been dreaming about him... at least, so he thought. He had never really had a chance to observe her behaviour in dreams, but from what he knew about her from her waking life it seemed entirely in character. Of course, that didn't mean that this couldn't still be a Liz image, created by his subconscious because he wanted to be with her, and acting as if she knew that it was a dream... but still, Max couldn't help but wonder. Could he and Liz be sharing a dream? Of course, that would mean that Liz was sleeping now too, and he wouldn't have expected that - she'd been so concerned about him that he thought she'd watch as he slept, just to make sure that he was okay. But - well, it didn't really matter, and Liz was looking at him exactly like she always did when she was wondering what was on his mind because he was staying silent and had a thoughtful expression.

"Maybe I am," he said finally, smiling. "Is there anything wrong with that?"

"Anyway, I didn't really mean like this in terms of the beach and Corpus Christi," Liz continued, swimming backwards for a bit. not really a proper backstroke with her body horizontal and legs kicking out of the water, but like she was inclined backwards at something slightly flatter than a forty five degree angle. "It's a nice diversion, yeah, especially considering all that's going on. I... I just meant, we love each other, and we're... we're going to be leaving home together, off to start a new life together somewhere else. Not - not exactly the way I thought it would ever happen, but... but I always hoped that we'd spend our lives together, back before... before we ever kissed, or anything." She sighed. "That... that was one of the things I wrote about you in your journal the time it went missing, and then when it came back you wanted to look at it and I was afraid to show it to you." She sighed. "I just... I wasn't ready for opening myself up to you just then - I knew that it would change everything if you knew how I felt about you." Max had seen her journal since then, of course - once Liz felt a bit more comfortable opening up to him, she'd let him read most of it, though she still had a few passages she didn't want him to look at.

"And it was Michael who swiped it all along, and you promised not to tell me," Max said, wondering what this dream Liz's reaction would be.

She didn't quite swallow water, but it was a near thing. "Wh... what makes you think that?" she said, and despite her cool words, Max could tell... well, if he had been sure this was really Liz, he would have been sure of the answer. As it was, the possibility that the dream was really all in his own subconscious still provided one slim element of doubt.

"Rath said that, when Kyle was telling Ava part of the story of the missing journal, on our way to Corpus Christi."

"Wait a second," Liz insisted. "The... I think the only time you, Rath, Kyle, and Ava were in a car together on that trip, I was there too."

"This is so," Max agreed. "But you slept some, in the back seat. Remember?" Liz considered, and nodded. "I haven't asked Michael about it - didn't want to embarass him or put him on the spot. But it seemed to fit with everything about that incident better than any other theory I've ever had, and I do think that Rath has some insight about the sort of things that go on in Michael's head." He sighed. "They're more alike than either of them wants to think, really... a few differences in character, but largely Rath is the person who Michael would have been if he'd grown up in that environment, I think." Max sighed at that thought. He didn't like the notion that Michael could have plotted to kill him... but, well, there but for the grace of a few shapeshifting aliens -

"And, well, I guess none of us will ever really know Zan, but I think he was pretty close to what you would have been like if you'd ended up in New York. Ava's told me quite a bit about him." And then Liz giggled slightly. "The girls, though, are quite a bit more different - Lonnie and Isabel, Tess and Ava. That's... that's the key."

Max looked over at Liz, startled. "The key to what?"

"Umm, among other things - the meaning of Christin's message," Liz said, wrapping her arms around Max's neck, but still staying at arm's length from him, (literally,) not coming in for a kiss or a close embrace. "I've... I've figurd it out now, though the Liz who's awake now won't clue in yet for a bit. And... and let me tell you, Max - it's a _great_ secret! Kind of blows that whole you-and-Tess thing out of the water forever, and good riddance!"

"What? The Liz who's awake now?" Max was kind of confused about that remark to start with. "So... so Liz isn't sleeping... but you're _not_ just a product of my subconscious mind. I'm... I'm sure of that, because I really _don't_ know what the deal is with what you're telling me about." And then, it seemed to clue in. "Liz isn't sleeping, but I still managed to draw some aspect of her subconscious mind - the dreaming self - into my own dream. She's not dreaming, but you're the same part of her that... that would be creating her dream if she were." Liz just giggled in reply, not commenting, as Max absorbed that idea, certain that he was right.

"Okay... what do you mean it blows Tess out of the water, or Tess and me and destiny?" he asked. "I... I thought Tess being my destiny was already in the past - a forgotten thing, a non-issue. How... how can this."

"Yeah, I know, we moved on, we made our decision, but... but I think there was still a part of us that couldn't let go of the symbolic beauty of it, the idea of a love that stretched beyond death," Liz told him seriously. "Even when you found out that Tess wasn't who she pretended to be, that she didn't really love you, you still missed the idea. We chose to make a new destiny, but that didn't seem as fitting, as momentous. But this... it may not have the free-will stubbornness of making our own destinies, but it gives us everything that was on the other side." Liz giggled. "Destiny wins, but we win too."

"_What_?" Max exclaimed, completely baffled by all of this, and then Liz kissed him, and so great was the passion of that kiss that it shattered the ocean and the beach - leaving him washed up back on the back seat of the van, still feeling very tired and his leg aching - but not so much as it had been, at least he thought so. "Umm... where are we?" he asked.


	13. Chapter 13: All aboard

Liz smiled slightly, seeing him awake, and Max tried to think of a way to test what he had learned from his dream of her, but couldn't be sure. Obviously she hadn't been dreaming too. "Umm, we're nearly at that town Childwold, where we're supposed to get off the main road. A... a few twinges of - well, we think that Kivar isn't too far away, but he hasn't shown his car yet."

"Uh-oh," Max muttered. "Wait a second - how long have I been out?"

"Over two hours, maybe close to three," Isabel replied. "You needed the rest." Max nodded slightly, accepting this.

"Is... is there some way we can try to use our powers to obstruct pursuit?" Max muttered. "Once we're on the dirt road, perhaps. Blow holes behind us as we go or set up nasty speed bumps."

"Hmm... possible," Liz decided. "Would be big inconveniences to any innocent passers-by, but I think maybe our needs outweigh theirs a little. We should be careful not to do anything potentially fatal though." She sighed. "And I don't think you're strong enough to be taking part in an operation like that." Max opened his mouth, but - "No arguments, mister. Rathers!"

"Yeah, your majesty?" Rath said. Max did a bit of a double-take about that - was he just being sarcastic because Liz was so close to him, 'the king'? Something seemed to tug at Max's mind, but he couldn't work it out.

"How long before we make the turnoff, do you think?"

"Not sure, maybe fifteen minutes or so. And if you're asking me if I'll be interested in coming back there and laying some booby traps for Kivar's car - I'd be delighted."

"Who else is up there?" Max asked, trying to look at the front of the car but unable to see past Liz and Isabel's seat from where he was - he tried to lift his head but Liz would have none of that, reaching out and pushing him back into a fully reclined position. "Is Rath driving?"

"No, Jim is behind the wheel, and Rath's been co-piloting," Isabel explained. Well, that made some sense - he didn't think that they'd have asked him to go back if Rath had been the one driving. It would probably be possible to switch drivers here in the van using the same techniquest that they'd been using in the motor home, but it would probably be a bit trickier, and for best effect they'd need to have someone with alien powers in the co-pilot's chair, holding the controls steady using a telekinetic grip while a third person took over driving.

Max put that thought aside, and turned back to Liz. "I... I had a dream, and you were in it," he blurted out. "Talking about your hopes, and your journal... and the message from Christin. I... I realize that this sounds a little weird, but I think that I might have been dreamwalking your subconscious self when you were awake."

"Hmm," Liz considered this. "Doesn't really pass my current litmus test of 'weird.'" Max laughed at the way she put that. "What... what did she say about the message? Anything useful?"

"Umm..." Max thought about it. "That... that it had something to do with Isabel-Lonnie and Ava-Tess - why they were so different from each other. And... and maybe why I fell in love with you instead of Tess."

"Wow," Liz said. "Hmm... gonna have to think more about that, see if it shakes anything loose. Though I suppose if my subconscious mind really has things all figured out, then I don't need to worry - it'll come to me when I'm ready."

"But possibly thinking about what it might mean is how you help yourself get ready," Isabel put in. Max shot her a none-too-patient look. "Sorry, I just - umm, didn't mean to interrupt a private moment there, it's just -err, a little hard to t..."

"That's okay, Isabel," Liz said to her. "I know that you have a lot of experience with this dreams and subconscious stuff, and I value your input." She sighed. "When... when did you first realize that you had the dreamwalking power, anyway? If there's a story there, I don't think it's one that I've ever heard."

"It's not a great one," Isabel decided. "I think the first time I did it was with my Dad, and... and I didn't even realize it had anything to do with dreams at the time. I... I had woken up in the middle of the night and gone downstairs to get some chocolate milk, and I went into the living room to drink it, and I saw a picture of him and reached out to touch it. I didn't understand what had happened, was worried that I'd fallen into some strange other world like sometimes happened in story books, you know? And then my mom found me lying on the couch with my eyes closed and shook me out of it, and when I tried to explain what had happened, she said that I must have been dreaming. I didn't understand that it was really other people's dreams until, well..."

The story took a long time, and was one that Max had been familiar with, so he mostly zoned out what his sister was saying and watched Liz's face. All of a sudden, the Van slowed down, made a sharp right turn onto much bumpier ground. "Okay, I'm coming back there," Rath said, and he did, although it seemed to take him a while to maneuver between the two front seats, around the turned-around middle seat, and crouch next to Isabel. They concentrated out the back window for quite a while, and Max wanted to take a look, but he didn't want to get in the way of their concentration. He head a bunch of interesting sounds from outside, behind the van, though.

Eventually Isabel tugged on Rath's arm. "Okay, okay, that's enough, I'm slightly pooped, and we can't worry too much about this sort of thing," she muttered, and Rath hesitated a second before nodding.

"Okay, how far did that message say?" Jim called from the front. "I've been keeping an eye on the odometer since we left Childwold."

"Umm... eight miles," Max muttered, and Liz repeated that more loudly for Mister Valenti's benefit. "The people in the motor home will probably be counting too."

"Right," Isabel said, still puffing a bit.

They bumped and rumbled along the rough road for a breathless interval of time more. Max started to wonder if someone had already been along this track, trying to make it impassable, but decided that that was probably unlikely. Suddenly... Mister Valenti must have slammed on the brakes, and Max very nearly fell off his seat. Rath kinda stumbled a bit too, and Liz and Isabel were pushed back against their seat. "What... what happened?" Isabel called out.

"Umm... I think something happened to the motor home," Valenti said. "Isabel, Rath, why don't you go out and see."

"No, I'm not taking my eyes off the road behind us," Isabel insisted. "Barriers or not, I don't trust Kivar to come out of nowhere just when we least expect him." She sighed. "But since Rath is going out to take a look, I, umm, I'll keep rear watch from outside the van." She slipped out the wide panel door, which Rath had left open.

Liz helped Max back into his seat, and sat there, waiting with him, holding both of his hands in hers, as they waited for word. Finally Rath was back. "Umm, maybe you guys had better come out," Rath said around a minute later. "It... it's not clear, but the general feeling is that we'll have to carry on on foot from here - at least, most of us will be on foot, Max. We might be able to..."

"Oh, come on, I'm not completely helpless," Max said, and he sat up and limped out the door. "Don't look at me like that, Liz," he said. "It's partly just because I haven't been on my feet for so long."

"I... I was looking at you more because I'm fond of you than because I'm worried about you," she said, and Max smiled slightly, and put an arm around her shoulders to help support him while his legs woke up. He was pretty sure that he'd be able to keep pace after a few minutes of getting used to walking again.

He wasn't quite prepared for the sight that greeted him. The motor home had managed to get well wedged between two trees that were both very close to the edges of the trail. "Hey, Max," Michael said. "We... we could probably get it free by cutting the trees down with our powers, or even just sawing pieces out of the trunks where they're touching the chassis, but it doesn't really seem worth the effort."

"The trail just gets narrower up ahead?" Max guessed. "Lots more tight scrapes?"

"Well, the car trail hangs a left," Ava put in. "Turns west. Now, since our directions were to go eight miles north, I have to say that I think that means that we shouldn't continue along a trail that's going at least a mile and a half in a direction that's not north in the slightest."

"Is there a way to go straight north?" Liz asked. "A footpath or something?"

"Yeah," Michael agreed. "Not sure how far that goes, but it seems promising. We've gone a little over seven miles from the town I think - it's not that much further on foot."

"It's do-able, I guess," Max agreed. One mile on foot through a narrow path would take them much longer than seven miles in their vehicles, on the trail - but that was the way it went. "Okay, let's round up and get going. Leave both the vehicles."

"What... what about our stuff?" Maria asked. "I... I know we won't need the snacks or the computer gear, but - I've got some sentimental items that I want to..."

"Alright, get'em quickly," Michael insisted. "No more than you can carry easily. We can't let sentiment slow us down here." Maria headed back into the motor home.

Max turned to Liz. "Is... is there anything you need to..."

"No," she said quickly. "I... I've got you, and as much as you protest, I suspect I'm going to have my hands full making sure that you get where we're going. I... I don't really need anything else, and that's the truth." Max smiled. "What about you?" she asked.

"No, I won't worry about taking anything," he said. "I also suspect I'll have enough trouble carrying myself." Liz chuckled.

"You guys can carry the orbs," Michael suggested, chucking the small fist-sized alien artifacts at them. "Shouldn't slow you down much, and I suspect that they might be of interest to those who are paying our fare. Couldn't really hurt." Max smiled and jammed one of the orbs into his pants pockets - a bit of a tight fit, but that was better than carrying it and not having his hands free. Soon everyone was ready, and they headed off to the small, uneven path that had been found continuing north by northeastish. After only a few minutes progress, Max could hear somebody heading the other way, approaching them. "Halt!" Michael called out. "Who goes there?"

"Well met on this quite impressive journey of yours," a semi-familiar voice answered. "It's Christin. Thought you might have a bit of trouble with this part."

Liz rushed forward, nearly dragging Max along behind her. "Christin - Max is hurt," she said. "His leg... took a particle blast, and he wasn't able to heal himself fully. "Can - can you help?" Right around the end there, Liz pulled ahead of Michael and Lonnie, who'd been leading the way, and they both caught sight of Christin - the old version. It seemed very odd to Max that she would take this shape for wandering around in the woods instead of the younger, cute and healthy version, but oh well. (As far as that went, old Christin was probably just as fit as any of them, or more so, and as agile and as good endurance and so on - she just didn't look particularly like it.) Somehow, it seemed to help when she took hold of Max's hand and looked into his eyes - it was easier to remember that this was a medical event. With the pretty redhead, Max would have been hard-pressed to shake the notion that Christin was trying to hit on him.

He hadn't thought of the fact that Christin had healing powers in connection with himself until Liz asked for her help. Of course, she had healed Jenni, so he probably should have put it together. A sudden rush of imagery flashed through his mind... nothing he could immediately make sense of - arguments with other people, maybe shapeshifters and maybe humans. Running through an old-fashioned slum district late at night - had the Special Unit been after her then? And examining some odd-looking cells through a powerful microscope.

Then the connection was over, and his leg was almost entirely better. Max blinked in bemusement - he'd never been on the receiving end of a healing in that way - mostly because he'd never known of another alien who had healing powers. Maybe Zan had... but nobody had ever really mentioned them in connection with him. (He'd have to ask Ava about that.) "Th- thanks, Christin."

"Not a problem. Now _move your ass_, Your Majesty!" Christin replied, obviously taking some considerable pleasure in being able to say such a thing, just once. Most of the group had drawn near, and Michael and Rath had already passed the three of them (Liz, Max, Christin,) and led the way as the entire group hurried as quickly as possible. "It's about three quarters of a mile from here to where the ship was landed, and some pretty rough going. Hopefully Kivar's people will have some problems following us too - but they're skins, and none of you can match their pace, even if they haven't figured out some kind of conveyance capable of following is through here."

"Oh, great," Isabel said.

"Christin," Maria suddenly blurted out. "My mom - Kyle's dad, and Michael's sister. They... they followed us here this far, but - but I don't think any of them are really comfortable with jumping into a spaceship and going to some other planet. Is... is there any way that they can be kept safe here on Earth? Will Kivar be eager to chase them if - if the rest of us get away safe?"

"Umm... wow," Christin muttered. "I - I'm really not sure about that one, to be honest. Might need to ask the others. All of this plan has been jerry-rigged at the last moment, especially when Larek couldn't get to Roswell in time to talk to you."

"Speaking of the spaceship and other planets," Max panted, noting that Christin was definitely keeping pace with all of them easily despite her apparent age. "What... what's the destination? And - and do you have room for all of us in any event, if there isn't any other safe way?"

"Oh, shit, I hadn't thought about the space," Christin said. "How many of you _are_ there, anyway?"

"Thirteen," Laurie supplied helpfully."

"Okay, then, yeah, three people staying behind here on Earth would definitely help. We could probably handle more, but it'll mean overloading the sleeping chambers, putting three into quarters meant for two, over a long journey - and that's bad. It's easy enough to get cabin fever on a trip like this one even when you aren't crammed in there like Sardines." Christin shook her head. "And to answer your other question, Max - the intended destination is - is the planet of Sanctuary, where you'll be able to see Queen Alinda and Tess. Of course, if you have other preferences, they'll be considered, but..."

"No, that sounds fine, to me at least," Max agreed, and then groaned as a stitch popped out in his side. He forced himself to keep lurching forward slightly, breathing heavily to try and get more oxygen into his bloodstream. "What... what's that sound?"

"I... I don't hear anything," Liz said. But Christin dropped back slightly to keep pace with them, and she was cocking her head to one side slightly.

"Damn it all."

Max and Liz both turned to Christin, who blazed with light suddenly and was back to her young appearance for some reason. "Okay, somebody from Kivar's team is going to be here any minute, maybe more than one," Christin announced loud enough to be heard further away than just the three of them. "There's no way to outrun them - they're coming by air."

"By... by air?" Max muttered. "Where would they get an air vehicle from?"

"From whatever car they were driving," Christin replied. Max stared. "It's... it's a known earth survival technique - taking a post-1980s automatic transmission and using it to make an air vehicle with a Startanian power conversion engine." She sighed. "Somebody Kivar took with him _must_ have learned it." She looked around. "Stick tight, cover the people who don't have firepower of their own." She lowered her voice to talk to Max and Liz. "I... I'm going to need your help for my offense."

"Why... why Liz?" Max blurted out. "She... whatever powers she has, she can hardly even use them yet."

"No, she's ready," Christin insisted. "She's ready to become who she was always going to be. Healing her was just a detail." She turned to Liz. "I... I thought it might help - so I got a few of my friends to pay a visit to the Crashdown one September day."

Liz's mouth dropped open. "You... you arranged for my shooting - because you **wanted** Max to save my life? You... you turned our lives into hell for a year, if not more! How did that **help**?"

"Incoming," Christin replied, so matter-of-factly that Liz didn't realize the point for a moment. Then she realized that something was zooming over the trees behind of them, and a single power blast rocketed down through the path, landing well clear of any of them.

"It... that doesn't seem like a terribly effective way to launch an attack in this situation," Max decided. "If we get into the underbrush, they'll hardly even be able to see us. And they can't shoot directly underneath, from what I can tell of the design of that thing."

"Yeah," Kristin put in. "But we don't want them to set fire to the forest, because they can't find us - or fly around far enough to spot the ship." She sighed. "And if they can't see us, we can't see them." By this time, most of the rest of the party had taken cover well away from the path. "Now that they think they've got us, they'll probably loop around and do another pass, to the side of the path, so that they can shoot over the side of the vehicle down among us." And Christin smiled fiercely. "Everybody picks a body and _shoves_. Actually, no, we've gotta pick now. I'll take the guy in the lead, the pilot - Max, you do the rearmost, and Liz, you take someone in the middle if there is one. Got it?"

"N-no," Liz insisted. "Why... why do you think that I'll be able to do th..." She trailed off, a look of wonder on her face. "Oh my god... I get it now."

"Then look alive?" Christin insisted. Sure enough, the plane was coming back for its pass, the aliens aboard it shooting horrible energy weapons down all around them. "Three, two, one, _go_!"

Max reached out with his mental energies and _pushed_, and three humanoid bodies fell out of the air vehicle, which suddenly dived without anyone at the controls. Christin rushed back down the path towards where it was going to hit, while Max headed for where the Skins would land. Lonnie, Mrs Deluca, and Jim Valenti were near there, as it happened, and in front of Max's eyes, one Skin landed the wrong way on the small of his back and disintegrated immediately. Lonnie picked up a tree branch and instantly killed the second. Max just had time to scream out as Valenti took aim for a swift kick at the third. Jim's aim didn't waver from the interruption, though. "Oh, my god."

"It's... it's the way it had to be," Liz assured him. "They... they wouldn't have surrendered if you'd offerend mercy. With their powers, they were living weapons - one of them could probably have killed Valenti in a few seconds. He - he had too..." Max knew that Liz was right, but somehow that didn't make it easier.

"Anyone who doesn't want to get on the spaceship, get over here!" Christin called. Curious, Max and Liz followed along with Jim, Amy, and Laurie, as everyone else headed further up the trail. It turned out that Christin had salvaged the air vehicle in operating condition. "Any of you have experience piloting?"

"Um, a little, but just propeller planes," Jim insisted.

"This is easier," Christin assured him, and quickly went over the controls for turning, increasing or decreasing airspeed, climbing or dropping. "If you head west, it should take you nearly to Waterton, on the edge of Lake Ontario," she suggested. "From there, you can get a rental car. Have you all got good passports?" They nodded. "Then go north from Waterton, I'd suggest, across the Canadian border, to Ottawa. You can catch a plane back into the states from there. Good luck."

Max turned to Jim and Laurie, his head whirling. "Are... are you guys sure about this?"

"It - it seems to be our best chance," Jim said, hugging him briefly. "Good luck, Max. It's been incredible getting to know you."

"Give all my love to Maria, Liz," Amy insisted, hugging Liz.

"And tell Michael that he damn well better come back to visit," Laurie added, and all of them laughed. Max and Liz insisted on staying and watching until the plane had taken off safely and was out of view. Then Christin made them keep running.

"Liz - what - what did you mean when you said you got it?" Max panted. He knew that they should save their breath for running, but somehow he - he had to know this, he couldn't afford to wait.

"What... what Christin had been trying to tell me back in Pittsburgh," Liz said. "It... it was too much to take in all at once like that, which is why I got the amnesia. Christin - there was... there was some kind of power struggle over the Roswell hybrid pods, there at Maideckezne rocks, wasn't there?"

"Yeah," Christin agreed. "Keep going. I - I want to see how well you've worked it out."

"Okay. Let's see... somebody wanted to... to abort Isabel, or to flush Vilandra's soul out of her and let her develop as a clean slate. Because... because Vilandra had betrayed the Royals, and they didn't think that she deserved another shot." Liz sighed. "Somebody else... was fiercely devoted to Vilandra, and wanted to make sure that she lived again. I... I'm not quite sure how it happened, but - but things ended up with Vilandra's soul inside Tess' pod - Ava's soul... without a permanent home, and Isabel's body without a soul. Umm... Christin, a little help here?"

Christin helped her up the steep incline, and also, Max wasn't sure if this was what Liz had meant, but helped her tell the story on. "Yeah. That was where things stood when I got to New Mexico. Because Isabel's body had already been through trauma having the Vilandra soul extracted, and we couldn't complete the switch and insert Ava's traumatized soul. It would have been too much, Isabel would have aborted. But Isabel wasn't going to develop properly without a soul - there are all kinds of neurological implications of the soul implantation technique."

"So... so they needed the soul of someone else who died to put into Isabel," Liz added. "Someone who was very closely related to Vilandra, ideally, to help the soul take a firm root in her DNA..."

"Princess Arynda," Max filled in. Christin nodded. "So Isabel's my little sister... and _Tess_ was Vilandra? She's my sister too, in terms of her soul, and when... when we..."

"Don't worry too much about that part, Max," Liz put in. "I mean... the baby, he'll have the DNA that really was queen Ava's. He'll be okay."

"Still, that doesn't help with the emotional squick factor," Max put in.

"I'd say 'serves you right', except I'm not sure you ever had much choice about sleeping with Tess," Liz put in. "How about 'life sucks sometimes'? But anyway - the Ava situation was different, right? You had her soul - but you couldn't make a new hybrid clone body for her." Christin uh-huhed. "And... and as weird as this sounds - you were able to divide the soul in half, and implant it deeply into - into two young women who lived in the Roswell area in the fifties."

"Two... two women?" Max asked. "Liz... your - your grandmothers?"

Liz looked to Christin for one final confirmation, and she nodded. "Yeah, looks like it. I - I can hardly believe it myself, but that's what happened. They passed their soul fragments onto their first children, when they had them... a boy and a girl, who grew up into a man and a woman - who fell in love when they first met each other, because those buried half souls recognized that they could become one whole." Liz blushed slightly, looking as if she was trying not to get a swelled head from that. "And... and they did, when I was born." She chuckled. "I... I was born to be your bride, Max, and neither of us ever knew it until now."

"So... so you've got an alien soul?" Max asked. "Ava's soul, the original Queen Ava. But... but you were human - until Christin arranged to have me save your life, and start spreading alien DNA into your system."

"I... I'm really sorry about how the shooting attracted the Special Unit's attention, by the way," Christin added. "I hadn't really... well, I, umm..." She paused. "There it is!"

Sure enough, there was a clearing ahead, and in the clearing, a large and definitely alien looking... Max would have thought it was a kind of building instead of a space vessel if he hadn't known better, but he could definitely believe that it would move. There was a port, and Kyle and Lonnie were just going inside. "They're using airlock protocols," Christin mentioned. "There are pure Antarians on board, who can't breathe earth air with all the pollutants in it, even here. So they run off the l..."

And just then, there was the sound of a tree toppling behind them. The three of them ran towards the ship as quickly as they could. When they were almost there, Max heard a roar, and he turned around to face back. He caught a glimpse of a tall, handsome and intelligent looking dark haired man, pointing his hand at Liz. Max generated the shield just an instant before the white laser beam bounced off it, carrying enough energy to stagger him. Then Liz was pulling him into the airlock. "Deflectors on!" Christin shouted at a spot on the airlock wall, and just before the door closed Max saw a field of glittering blue sparked emerge a few inches beyond it. "That... that should hold him off until we've climbed out of range," she managed to breathe.

"How... how long before we can go in?" Liz asked. Already there was a rumbling, and Max wondered if the ship was beginning to climb into the air so soon.

"Maybe a minute and a half."

"Well, I can't wait," Max decided, turning to Liz. Her eyes widened slightly. "Didn't picture having a witness like Christin for this, and I certainly never expected what we found out tonight. But..." Max pulled out something from his pocket, and Liz let out a squeak.

"I... I had a chance to duck into a pawn shop while we were off on that gas run, and I remembered what Isabel said about Antarian customs." He opened up the jewelry box, took out a necklace with a golden heart pendant, and held it out towards her. "I... I love you and I want us to be together, to be husband and wife, no matter where we spend our lives. Say you'll marry me."

Liz giggled. "It'll probably end up being this incredibly huge State wedding that neither of us can control, and we'll be more than glad for it just to be over," she said. "Would've been much simpler to elope to Las Vegas when we had the chance."

Max smiled. "Even so."

"Oh, come on. Of course I'll marry you, what, did you really think I'd say anything else?" she teased him. Liz turned her back, sweeping her hair out of the way, and let Max put the two ends of the chain together, then adjusted the pendant to make sure that it fell over her heart as per tradition.

When they finally got through the inner airlock door, Liz blurted out the news to Maria and Ava, and quickly happy chaos was reigning through the ship.


	14. Epilog

"Come on, Jim," Philip Evans said, trying to restrain himself from sounding like he was cross-examining a hostile witness. (Especially since he _didn't_ do trial work, so it would send entirely the wrong impression.) "We... we just want to know what happened. We won't blame you for anything, and we won't spread around any secrets. It's just..." His voice dropped, and he took his wife's hand. "All of our kids are gone, and we just want some kind of closure."

"We're... we're not asking for everything to be explained at a stroke," Nancy Parker put in. "I... I realize that that might be more than you'd want to get into at this point. But... you've admitted that you left town with... with the whole gang."

"...not asking you to tell the whole story about that Tess girl, who was inseperable from Max for - for nearly a month, and who was living with you because her father had disappeared, or that's what people said," Diane Evans was apparently stuck on contiuing her husband's line of thought. Maybe it was a speech that they had worked out together. "And then she disappeared, supposedly gone back east, but I **know** I saw her back in town just a few days before everybody left - saw her with Michael. I'm not asking you to say if Max and Isabel really had anything to do with why you lost your job, or what you know about all the other times they disappeared for a few days, or left town, or..."

"It - I think it comes down to a few very simple questions, at this point," John Whitman said in his quiet voice, and everybody else - including his wife, Liz's father, and Amy DeLuca turned to him. "Where were the kids when you last saw them. What did they tell you about their immediate plans?"

"Well..." Jim sighed, looked over at Maria's mother. She nodded slightly. "We were... were all in the Adirondack state park in New York, several miles north of a place called Childwold. And they... they said that they were going to go into an alien spaceship, that had landed there in the woods, and go with the aliens when they left the planet."

"C-come on, Jim," Jeff scoffed. "I... I can understand your desire to keep their confidence, but don't - don't insult our..."

"_That is the truth_!" Jim insisted fiercely, his eyes blazing at Jeff Parker. "Don't... don't tell me that you're insulted at it, Mister Crashdown. There... there are more things in... on earth and in the heavens, than are **dreamt** of in the minds of - of just about anybody. Think about that. Think about it when the tourists come into your restaurant tonight. Sure... nobody really believes in it now - but there is a kernel of truth behind every rumour."

"Amy, come on," Gloria Whitman insisted. "You can't seriously tell me that..."

"Jim - Jim is getting to sound a little bit like a nutjob, I admit," Mrs Deluca said affectionately, "but I... I saw the spaceship, Gloria." She sighed. "Just... just a glimpse... as we were flying out of the woods in a... in a flying device that was itself rather unearthly." She stood up. "We've... we've told you what you wanted to know, and I think that it's better to let you chew on that much now rather than elaborate any further. Come on, Jim." He rose, put his hand in Amy's, and she patted. "Dinner at my place tonight, I think. Helps to make it seem a little less empty, now that Maria's gone."

And they left the Evans living room and headed out to the Jetta parked in the driveway.


End file.
